Tavily Search MCP Server

MCP Server Configuration

Copy
{
  "mcpServers": {
    "tavily": {
      "command": "npx",
      "args": ["-y", "tavily-mcp"],
      "env": {
        "TAVILY_API_KEY": "<your-api-key>"
      }
    }
  }
}

Available Tools

Tool	Description
search	Search the web with AI-optimized results
extract	Extract clean content from specific URLs

Features

• AI-optimized results: Returns concise, relevant snippets tuned for LLM context windows
• Content extraction: Pulls clean text from URLs, stripping ads and navigation
• Search depth control: Basic (fast) or Advanced (thorough) search modes
• Domain filtering: Include or exclude specific domains
• Topic categories: General, news, or finance-specific search

Setup

1. Sign up at https://tavily.com
2. Get your API key from the dashboard
3. Replace <your-api-key> with your actual key
4. Free tier: 1,000 searches/month

Usage Examples

• "Search for the latest Next.js 15 breaking changes"
• "Find best practices for PostgreSQL connection pooling in Node.js"
• "Extract the content from this changelog URL and summarize it"
• "Search for known issues with React Server Components and third-party libraries"
• "Find current pricing for AWS Lambda in us-east-1"

When to Use Tavily vs Exa

Feature	Tavily	Exa
Speed	Faster for simple queries	Better for complex semantic search
Results	Concise snippets	Full content extraction
Best for	Quick lookups, fact-checking	Deep research, code discovery
Free tier	1,000/month	1,000/month

Security Notes

• API key grants search access only - no write operations
• Store key in .claude/settings.local.json (gitignored)
• Search queries may contain project context - be mindful of sensitive terms
• Results are fetched from public web only