mcp-hacker-news

mcp-hacker-news

A Model Context Protocol (MCP) server for Hacker News built with TypeScript.

This MCP server acts as a bridge between the official Hacker News API and AI-powered tools that support the Model Context Protocol, such as Claude and Cursor.

It enables these tools to fetch and interact with live Hacker News data (posts, comments, users) via standardized MCP endpoints.

Usage with Claude Desktop

Add to your Claude Desktop configuration (claude_desktop_config.json):

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "mcp-hacker-news": {
      "command": "npx",
      "args": ["-y", "mcp-hacker-news"]
    }
  }
}

Features

• Integrates with the official Hacker News API to fetch posts, comments, and user information.
• Exposes standard Model Context Protocol endpoints for seamless integration with Claude, Cursor, and other LLM-based tools.
• Fetches the latest Hacker News data for AI and automation workflows.

Requirements

• Node.js version 18 or higher is required.
• npm or pnpm as a package manager.

⚠️ If you are unsure about your Node.js version, run node --version in your terminal. Make sure it shows v18.x.x or higher.
How to upgrade Node.js

Want to contribute? Just follow the steps below

Clone the repository and install dependencies:

git clone https://github.com/paablolc/mcp-hacker-news.git
cd mcp-hacker-news
pnpm install
pnpm build

• To test the server with the MCP Inspector:

pnpm inspector

• or, if running from the source:

npx @modelcontextprotocol/inspector node dist/index.js

Resources

This MCP server exposes the following fixed resources, each corresponding to a core Hacker News endpoint:

Resource URI	Description	Hacker News API Endpoint
hackernews://top	Top stories	/v0/topstories
hackernews://new	Newest stories	/v0/newstories
hackernews://best	Best (algorithmic) stories	/v0/beststories

These three collections match the main list endpoints officially provided by the Hacker News API.
Other types of stories (Ask HN, Show HN, Jobs, etc.) and item-specific lookups are available as tools (see below), allowing for flexible querying with custom parameters.

Tools

The following tools are available for advanced or parameterized queries. These allow you to fetch other Hacker News content beyond the fixed resources above:

Tool Name	Description
getTopStories	Fetch top stories (customizable limit)
getBestStories	Fetch best stories (customizable limit)
getNewStories	Fetch newest stories (customizable limit)
getAskHNStories	Fetch "Ask HN" posts
getShowHNStories	Fetch "Show HN" posts
getJobStories	Fetch job postings
getItem	Retrieve a specific item (story, comment, etc.)
getUser	Retrieve a user profile by username
getComments	Fetch comments for a specific item
getMaxItemId	Get the current maximum item ID
getUpdates	Fetch recently updated items and profiles

Check the code or inline documentation for supported arguments and usage examples for each tool.

Tip:
Make sure you have pnpm installed for development setup.
You can substitute npm or yarn if you prefer, but pnpm is recommended for consistency.