Exa Search MCP server for AI agents

The Exa.ai MCP Server is an implementation of the Model Context Protocol that allows AI agents to perform web searches using Exa.ai's powerful search capabilities. It exposes a standardized search tool that can be used by any MCP-compatible client to access web-based information.

Prerequisites

Before using the Exa.ai MCP Server, you need to set up the following:

Install Bun, a JavaScript runtime:

curl -fsSL https://bun.sh/install | bash

Set up your Exa API key in your environment:
```
export EXA_API_KEY=your_api_key_here
```
You can add this line to your shell profile (.bashrc, .zshrc, etc.) to make it persistent across sessions.

To get your API key, sign up at Exa.ai.

Installation and Setup

Install the required dependencies:

bun install

Running the Server

To start the server in development mode:

bun dev

The server will start and listen for MCP client connections, allowing AI agents to perform web searches through the Exa.ai API.

Inspecting Protocol Interactions

If you need to debug or understand how MCP protocol interactions work:

bun inspect

This will provide detailed information about the requests and responses between MCP clients and the server.

How It Works

The Exa.ai MCP Server implements the Model Context Protocol to provide a standardized interface for AI agents to perform web searches. When an MCP-compatible client connects to the server, it can use the search tool to query the web through Exa.ai's search API.

For more information about the protocol and integration details, you can visit:

How to install this MCP server

For Claude Code

To add this MCP server to Claude Code, run this command in your terminal:

claude mcp add-json "exa-ai-mcp-server" '{"command":"npx","args":["-y","@mcprouter/exa-ai-mcp-server"]}'

See the official Claude Code MCP documentation for more details.

For Cursor

There are two ways to add an MCP server to Cursor. The most common way is to add the server globally in the ~/.cursor/mcp.json file so that it is available in all of your projects.

If you only need the server in a single project, you can add it to the project instead by creating or adding it to the .cursor/mcp.json file.

Adding an MCP server to Cursor globally

To add a global MCP server go to Cursor Settings > Tools & Integrations and click "New MCP Server".

When you click that button the ~/.cursor/mcp.json file will be opened and you can add your server like this:

{
    "mcpServers": {
        "exa-ai-mcp-server": {
            "command": "npx",
            "args": [
                "-y",
                "@mcprouter/exa-ai-mcp-server"
            ]
        }
    }
}

Adding an MCP server to a project

To add an MCP server to a project you can create a new .cursor/mcp.json file or add it to the existing one. This will look exactly the same as the global MCP server example above.

How to use the MCP server

Once the server is installed, you might need to head back to Settings > MCP and click the refresh button.

The Cursor agent will then be able to see the available tools the added MCP server has available and will call them when it needs to.

You can also explicitly ask the agent to use the tool by mentioning the tool name and describing what the function does.

For Claude Desktop

To add this MCP server to Claude Desktop:

1. Find your configuration file:

macOS: ~/Library/Application Support/Claude/claude_desktop_config.json
Windows: %APPDATA%\Claude\claude_desktop_config.json
Linux: ~/.config/Claude/claude_desktop_config.json

2. Add this to your configuration file:

{
    "mcpServers": {
        "exa-ai-mcp-server": {
            "command": "npx",
            "args": [
                "-y",
                "@mcprouter/exa-ai-mcp-server"
            ]
        }
    }
}

3. Restart Claude Desktop for the changes to take effect