Fetch MCP server

The Fetch MCP Server is a Model Context Protocol server that provides web content fetching capabilities. It allows Large Language Models to retrieve and process content from web pages, converting HTML to markdown format for easier consumption. The server includes functionality to read webpages in chunks through the start_index parameter.

Installation Options

Prerequisites

Optionally install Node.js to enable a more robust HTML simplifier.

Using uv (Recommended)

When using uv, no specific installation is needed. The uvx tool can directly run the MCP server:

uvx mcp-server-fetch

Using PIP

Install the server via pip:

pip install mcp-server-fetch

After installation, run it as a script:

python -m mcp_server_fetch

Configuration

Configure for Claude.app

Add the appropriate configuration to your Claude settings:

Using uvx

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "fetch": {
      "command": "uvx",
      "args": ["mcp-server-fetch"]
    }
  }
}

Using docker

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "fetch": {
      "command": "docker",
      "args": ["run", "-i", "--rm", "mcp/fetch"]
    }
  }
}

Using pip installation

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "fetch": {
      "command": "python",
      "args": ["-m", "mcp_server_fetch"]
    }
  }
}

Configure for VS Code

For manual installation, add the appropriate JSON configuration to your User Settings (JSON) file in VS Code or to .vscode/mcp.json in your workspace.

Using uvx

{
  "mcp": {
    "servers": {
      "fetch": {
        "command": "uvx",
        "args": ["mcp-server-fetch"]
      }
    }
  }
}

Using Docker

{
  "mcp": {
    "servers": {
      "fetch": {
        "command": "docker",
        "args": ["run", "-i", "--rm", "mcp/fetch"]
      }
    }
  }
}

Customization Options

Robots.txt Handling

By default, the server obeys a website's robots.txt file for model-initiated requests but not for user-initiated requests. Disable this behavior by adding --ignore-robots-txt to the args list in your configuration.

User-Agent Customization

The default user-agent can be customized by adding --user-agent=YourUserAgent to the args list.

Proxy Configuration

Configure a proxy by using the --proxy-url argument.

Windows Configuration

If experiencing timeout issues on Windows, set the PYTHONIOENCODING environment variable:

Windows configuration (uvx)

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "fetch": {
      "command": "uvx",
      "args": ["mcp-server-fetch"],
      "env": {
        "PYTHONIOENCODING": "utf-8"
      }
    }
  }
}

Windows configuration (pip)

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "fetch": {
      "command": "python",
      "args": ["-m", "mcp_server_fetch"],
      "env": {
        "PYTHONIOENCODING": "utf-8"
      }
    }
  }
}

Using the Server

Available Tools

The server provides the following tool:

• fetch: Fetches a URL and extracts its contents as markdown
  • Parameters:
    • url (string, required): URL to fetch
    • max_length (integer, optional): Maximum characters to return (default: 5000)
    • start_index (integer, optional): Start content from this character index (default: 0)
    • raw (boolean, optional): Get raw content without markdown conversion (default: false)

Debugging

Debug the server using the MCP inspector:

npx @modelcontextprotocol/inspector uvx mcp-server-fetch

For package installations in specific directories:

cd path/to/servers/src/fetch
npx @modelcontextprotocol/inspector uv run mcp-server-fetch

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 "fetch" '{"command":"uvx","args":["mcp-server-fetch"]}'

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": {
        "fetch": {
            "command": "uvx",
            "args": [
                "mcp-server-fetch"
            ]
        }
    }
}

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": {
        "fetch": {
            "command": "uvx",
            "args": [
                "mcp-server-fetch"
            ]
        }
    }
}

3. Restart Claude Desktop for the changes to take effect