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Brave Search MCP Server

Brave Search MCP Server is an MCP server that adds search and knowledge tools to AI assistants such as Claude Desktop, Claude Code and Cursor. Brave Search MCP Server: web results, images, videos, rich results, AI summaries, and more. It has 1,485 GitHub stars, is released under the MIT license and runs locally with npx -y @brave/brave-search-mcp-server.

github.com/brave/brave-search-mcp-server (opens in a new tab)

Install Brave Search MCP Server

Generated from the server's MCP registry entry. Replace your-value with your own values.

Claude Desktop

claude_desktop_config.json
{
  "mcpServers": {
    "brave-search-mcp-server": {
      "command": "npx",
      "args": [
        "-y",
        "@brave/brave-search-mcp-server"
      ],
      "env": {
        "BRAVE_API_KEY": "your-value"
      }
    }
  }
}

Settings > Developer > Edit Config. macOS: ~/Library/Application Support/Claude/, Windows: %APPDATA%\Claude\. Restart Claude Desktop afterwards.

Claude Code

claude mcp add --env BRAVE_API_KEY=your-value --transport stdio brave-search-mcp-server -- npx -y @brave/brave-search-mcp-server

Cursor

.cursor/mcp.json
{
  "mcpServers": {
    "brave-search-mcp-server": {
      "type": "stdio",
      "command": "npx",
      "args": [
        "-y",
        "@brave/brave-search-mcp-server"
      ],
      "env": {
        "BRAVE_API_KEY": "your-value"
      }
    }
  }
}

Project file; use ~/.cursor/mcp.json to enable it in every project.

VS Code

.vscode/mcp.json
{
  "inputs": [
    {
      "type": "promptString",
      "id": "brave_api_key",
      "description": "BRAVE_API_KEY",
      "password": true
    }
  ],
  "servers": {
    "brave-search-mcp-server": {
      "type": "stdio",
      "command": "npx",
      "args": [
        "-y",
        "@brave/brave-search-mcp-server"
      ],
      "env": {
        "BRAVE_API_KEY": "${input:brave_api_key}"
      }
    }
  }
}

Config formats checked against the official docs on Oct 7, 2026: modelcontextprotocol.io (opens in a new tab), code.claude.com (opens in a new tab), cursor.com (opens in a new tab), code.visualstudio.com (opens in a new tab).

Environment variables

Variables the server reads at startup.

NameRequiredDescription
BRAVE_API_KEYsecretYesYour API key for the service

Tools (40)

Parsed from the Tools section of the README; check the repository for the current list.

  • query

    Search terms (max 400 chars, 50 words)

  • country

    Country code (default: "US")

  • search_lang

    Search language (default: "en")

  • ui_lang

    UI language (default: "en-US")

  • count

    Results per page (1-20, default: 10)

  • offset

    Pagination offset (max 9, default: 0)

  • safesearch

    Content filtering ("off", "moderate", "strict", default: "moderate")

  • freshness

    Time filter ("pd", "pw", "pm", "py", or date range)

  • text_decorations

    Include highlighting markers (default: true)

  • spellcheck

    Enable spell checking (default: true)

  • result_filter

    Filter result types (default: ["web", "query"])

  • goggles

    Custom re-ranking definitions

  • units

    Measurement units ("metric" or "imperial")

  • extra_snippets

    Get additional excerpts (Pro plans only)

  • summary

    Enable summary key generation for AI summarization

  • entity_info

    Include entity information (default: false)

  • inline_references

    Add source URL references (default: false)

  • latitude

    Latitude of the search center (-90 to 90). Typically paired with longitude.

  • longitude

    Longitude of the search center (-180 to 180). Typically paired with latitude.

  • location

    Location string used as an alternative to latitude/longitude. For US locations prefer the form (e.g., san francisco ca…

  • radius

    Search radius around the supplied coordinates, in meters. If omitted, the search is performed globally.

  • geoloc

    Optional geolocation token used to refine results.

  • api-version

    Brave API version (YYYY-MM-DD)

  • accept

    Response media type (application/json or /)

  • cache-control

    Use no-cache to request fresh content

  • user-agent

    User agent originating the request

  • maximum_number_of_urls

    Maximum number of URLs to include (1-50)

  • maximum_number_of_tokens

    Approximate maximum number of context tokens (1024-32768)

  • maximum_number_of_snippets

    Maximum number of snippets to include (1-256)

  • context_threshold_mode

    Threshold mode ("disabled", "strict", "lenient", "balanced")

  • maximum_number_of_tokens_per_url

    Maximum tokens per URL (512-8192)

  • maximum_number_of_snippets_per_url

    Maximum snippets per URL (1-100)

  • enable_local

    Enable local recall

  • enable_source_metadata

    Include source metadata enrichment

  • x-loc-lat

    Client latitude (-90 to 90)

  • x-loc-long

    Client longitude (-180 to 180)

  • x-loc-city

    Client city name

  • x-loc-state

    Client state or region code

  • x-loc-state-name

    Client state or region name

  • x-loc-country

    Client country code

About Brave Search MCP Server

An MCP server implementation that integrates the Brave Search API, providing comprehensive search capabilities including web search, local business search, place search, image search, video search, news search, LLM context, and AI-powered summarization. This project supports both STDIO and HTTP transports, with STDIO as the default mode.

FAQ

Brave Search MCP Server FAQ

Still curious? Email info@appsgit.com.

What is Brave Search MCP Server?

Brave Search MCP Server is an MCP server that adds search and knowledge tools to AI assistants such as Claude Desktop, Claude Code and Cursor. Brave Search MCP Server: web results, images, videos, rich results, AI summaries, and more. It has 1,485 GitHub stars, is released under the MIT license and runs locally with npx -y @brave/brave-search-mcp-server. The source code is at github.com/brave/brave-search-mcp-server.

How do I install the Brave Search MCP Server MCP server?

Add the command npx -y @brave/brave-search-mcp-server to your MCP client: put it in claude_desktop_config.json for Claude Desktop, run claude mcp add for Claude Code, or add it to .cursor/mcp.json (Cursor) or .vscode/mcp.json (VS Code). The snippets on this page are ready to paste.

Is Brave Search MCP Server free?

The server is open source under the MIT license, so running it is free. It needs credentials (BRAVE_API_KEY) for the service it connects to, which may require a paid account.

Is Brave Search MCP Server actively maintained?

The most recent commit was on Oct 5, 2026. The latest release is v2.1.4, published Sep 17, 2026. appsgit only lists MCP servers with a commit in the last six months and re-checks every server daily.