# Hacker News MCP Server

> Source: <https://github.com/devrelopers/hackernews-mcp>
> Published: 2026-05-29 23:32:33+00:00

A small, read-only [Model Context Protocol](https://modelcontextprotocol.io) server that gives
Claude Desktop and Claude Code first-class access to Hacker News. It speaks MCP over **stdio** and
talks to two public, no-auth APIs:

**Official HN (Firebase)**—`https://hacker-news.firebaseio.com/v0/`

— feeds, items, and users.**Algolia HN Search**—`https://hn.algolia.com/api/v1/`

— full-text search.

No API keys, no accounts, nothing is mutated. Every tool is marked read-only.

| Tool | When to reach for it |
|---|---|
`get_stories` |
Browse a ranked feed. Returns a compact list (id, title, author, score, comment count, url, `hn_url` ) with no comment trees — ideal for scanning the front page or a section. Params: `category` (`top` /`new` /`best` /`ask` /`show` /`job` , default `top` ), `limit` (default 30, max 100). |
`get_item` |
Go deep on one thread. Returns the item plus a nested comment tree walked breadth-first. The tree is hard-capped by `max_comments` (default 50) and `max_depth` (default 3) so it never blows up your context; a `truncation_note` tells you when replies were cut. Dead/deleted comments are skipped. Params: `id` (required), `include_comments` (default true), `max_depth` (default 3), `max_comments` (default 50). |
`get_user` |
Look up a profile by username (case-sensitive). Returns karma, the about text, account creation date, and submitted-item count. Param: `id` (required). |
`search` |
Full-text search across all of HN via Algolia. Params: `query` (required), `sort` (`relevance` default, or `date` ), `tags` (e.g. `story` , `comment` , `ask_hn` , `show_hn` , `front_page` ), `min_points` (int), `limit` (default 20, max 100). Returns hits with title, author, points, comment count, date, story URL, and `hn_url` . |

Two conventions across all tools: every Unix timestamp is returned both raw (`time`

) and as an ISO 8601
UTC string (`time_iso`

), and every item carries a derived `hn_url`

(`https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=<id>`

).

Quick rule of thumb: `get_stories`

/`search`

to find things, `get_item`

to read one thing in depth.

Requires a recent stable Rust toolchain (edition 2021).

```
git clone https://github.com/devrelopers/hackernews-mcp
cd hackernews-mcp
cargo build --release
```

The binary lands at `target/release/hackernews-mcp`

.

Add an entry to your `claude_desktop_config.json`

:

**macOS:**`~/Library/Application Support/Claude/claude_desktop_config.json`

**Windows:**`%APPDATA%\Claude\claude_desktop_config.json`

```
{
  "mcpServers": {
    "hackernews": {
      "command": "/absolute/path/to/hackernews-mcp/target/release/hackernews-mcp"
    }
  }
}
```

Use the absolute path to the binary you just built (e.g.
`/Users/you/hackernews-mcp/target/release/hackernews-mcp`

). Restart Claude Desktop; the four tools
will appear under the 🔌 tools menu.

```
claude mcp add hackernews -- /absolute/path/to/hackernews-mcp/target/release/hackernews-mcp
```

- Item fetches in
`get_stories`

and`get_item`

run concurrently with a politeness cap of ~10 in-flight requests. - Logs are written to
**stderr** so they never corrupt the JSON-RPC stream on stdout. Set`RUST_LOG=debug`

for verbose tracing. - Missing items/users return an actionable error
(
`Item <id> not found — it may be deleted or the ID may be invalid.`

) rather than a panic.

```
src/
  main.rs     # tokio entrypoint + stdio transport wiring
  client.rs   # shared reqwest client over the Firebase + Algolia APIs
  tools.rs    # the four MCP tools + breadth-first comment-tree walker
  types.rs    # data models and compact output shapes
```

MIT — see [LICENSE](/devrelopers/hackernews-mcp/blob/main/LICENSE).