An MCP server implementation that integrates the Brave Search API, providing both web and local search capabilities.

Features

  • Web Search: General queries, news, articles, with pagination and freshness controls
  • Local Search: Find businesses, restaurants, and services with detailed information
  • Flexible Filtering: Control result types, safety levels, and content freshness
  • Smart Fallbacks: Local search automatically falls back to web when no results are found

Tools

  • brave_web_search
  • Execute web searches with pagination and filtering

  • Inputs:

    • query (string): Search terms
    • count (number, optional): Results per page (max 20)
    • offset (number, optional): Pagination offset (max 9)

  • brave_local_search

  • Search for local businesses and services
  • Inputs:
    • query (string): Local search terms
    • count (number, optional): Number of results (max 20)
  • Automatically falls back to web search if no local results found

Configuration

Getting an API Key

  1. Sign up for a Brave Search API account
  2. Choose a plan (Free tier available with 2,000 queries/month)
  3. Generate your API key from the developer dashboard

Usage with Claude Desktop

Add this to your claude_desktop_config.json:

Docker

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "brave-search": {
      "command": "docker",
      "args": [
        "run",
        "-i",
        "--rm",
        "-e",
        "BRAVE_API_KEY",
        "mcp/brave-search"
      ],
      "env": {
        "BRAVE_API_KEY": "YOUR_API_KEY_HERE"
      }
    }
  }
}

NPX

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "brave-search": {
      "command": "npx",
      "args": [
        "-y",
        "@modelcontextprotocol/server-brave-search"
      ],
      "env": {
        "BRAVE_API_KEY": "YOUR_API_KEY_HERE"
      }
    }
  }
}

Build

Docker build:

docker build -t mcp/brave-search:latest -f src/brave-search/Dockerfile .

License

This MCP server is licensed under the MIT License. This means you are free to use, modify, and distribute the software, subject to the terms and conditions of the MIT License. For more details, please see the LICENSE file in the project repository.

[
  {
    "description": "Performs a web search using the Brave Search API, ideal for general queries, news, articles, and online content. Use this for broad information gathering, recent events, or when you need diverse web sources. Supports pagination, content filtering, and freshness controls. Maximum 20 results per request, with offset for pagination. ",
    "inputSchema": {
      "properties": {
        "count": {
          "default": 10,
          "description": "Number of results (1-20, default 10)",
          "type": "number"
        },
        "offset": {
          "default": 0,
          "description": "Pagination offset (max 9, default 0)",
          "type": "number"
        },
        "query": {
          "description": "Search query (max 400 chars, 50 words)",
          "type": "string"
        }
      },
      "required": [
        "query"
      ],
      "type": "object"
    },
    "name": "brave_web_search"
  },
  {
    "description": "Searches for local businesses and places using Brave's Local Search API. Best for queries related to physical locations, businesses, restaurants, services, etc. Returns detailed information including:n- Business names and addressesn- Ratings and review countsn- Phone numbers and opening hoursnUse this when the query implies 'near me' or mentions specific locations. Automatically falls back to web search if no local results are found.",
    "inputSchema": {
      "properties": {
        "count": {
          "default": 5,
          "description": "Number of results (1-20, default 5)",
          "type": "number"
        },
        "query": {
          "description": "Local search query (e.g. 'pizza near Central Park')",
          "type": "string"
        }
      },
      "required": [
        "query"
      ],
      "type": "object"
    },
    "name": "brave_local_search"
  }
]