Best MCP Servers for Search

Give your AI assistant access to the web — from keyword search to semantic retrieval to documentation lookup.

6 search servers reviewed. 5 recommended, 0 conditional, 1 skip.

✅ Recommended

Brave Search MCP Server

✅ Recommended

Gives Claude access to Brave's web search, local business search, image search, video search, news search, and AI-powered summarization — all through one API key.

TypeScript Setup: Moderate search

Context7 MCP Server

✅ Recommended

Injects up-to-date, version-specific library documentation directly into LLM prompts — solves the hallucinated API problem.

TypeScript Setup: Easy search

Exa MCP Server

✅ Recommended

Semantic search engine for AI — finds content by meaning, not keywords, with deep research, code context, company lookup, and web crawling tools.

TypeScript Setup: Moderate search

Perplexity MCP Server

✅ Recommended

Official Perplexity AI server with four specialized tools — web search, conversational AI, deep research, and advanced reasoning with citations.

TypeScript Setup: Moderate search

Tavily MCP Server

✅ Recommended

AI-optimized search engine with extract, map, and crawl tools — returns results designed for LLM consumption, not human browsing.

TypeScript Setup: Moderate search

❌ Skip

GPT Researcher MCP Server

❌ Skip

Autonomous deep research agent that produces comprehensive reports with citations — multi-step web research with a STORM-inspired architecture.

Python Setup: Advanced research

How We Test Search MCP Servers

Every search server was tested with real queries across multiple domains — technical questions, current events, local businesses, and niche topics. We evaluate result quality, response speed, API cost structure, and whether the server adds genuine value over what Claude already knows from training data.

← Back to all MCP servers