Web Researcher MCP
Your AI research assistant that cites real sources and stays honest. Search the entire web or narrow it down to just the sites you trust; medical journals, court databases, news outlets, academic papers.
People who work with content extraction, research and web scraping and want it reachable from Claude, Cursor, VS Code, or another MCP client. The project is written in Go.
VERIFIED ACTIVE
LAST COMMIT 2026-09-28 · ★ 63 · #62 OF 97 MAINTAINED WEB SCRAPING · VERIFIED 2026-09-30
MIT · Go servers · how we verify → /methodology
01 · Install Web Researcher MCP
before you install - you'll need
Set GOOGLE_CUSTOM_SEARCH_API_KEY, GOOGLE_CUSTOM_SEARCH_ID, SEARCH_PROVIDER, BRAVE_API_KEY, INSTALL_DIR, SEARCH_ROUTING, SERPER_API_KEY, SEARXNG_URL, EXA_API_KEY, CUSTOM_LENSES_PATH, OAUTH_ISSUER_URL, OAUTH_AUDIENCE before connecting.
Docker
docker run -i --rm ghcr.io/zoharbabin/web-researcher-mcp:1.49.4 Claude Desktop - add to config
{
"mcpServers": {
"zoharbabin-web-researcher-mcp": {
"command": "docker",
"args": [
"run",
"-i",
"--rm",
"ghcr.io/zoharbabin/web-researcher-mcp:1.49.4"
]
}
}
} Using another client? Same JSON, different key
Claude Desktop · mcpServers
Cursor · mcpServers
VS Code · servers
Windsurf · mcpServers
Zed · context_servers
Cline · mcpServers
Roo Code · mcpServers
Continue · mcpServers
LibreChat · mcpServers
Gemini CLI · mcpServers
Codex CLI · mcp_servers
Full setup guides: every client.
02 · Evidence
Security posture
What to check before giving this server access to your agent - from the registry, GitHub, and our own probes. We don't score safety; we show what's verifiable.
runs as container (OCI image) - can be sandboxed away from your filesystem
license MIT - declared in the repository
registry namespace io.github.zoharbabin is GitHub-verified and matches the repo owner
03 · What Web Researcher MCP can do
Prose above is summarized from the project's README and registry record - no invented capabilities.
Latest releases
v1.49.4 · 2026-09-28
correct SearchApi response parsing and result limits (#742) (@evilive3000) · circuit-breaker provider-name loss + research_panel consensus/contradiction bugs (#745) (@zoharbabin) · Other · bump…
v1.49.3 · 2026-09-01
New Features · add optional You.com search provider (#709) (@mouse-value-add) · always run CodeQL on push to main (#718) (@zoharbabin) · Other · Run CodeQL for every pull request (#719) (@Copilot) · bump…
v1.49.2 · 2026-08-25
citation_graph influence filter, provider fallback, rate-limit provider name (#655, #656, #664) (#697) (@zoharbabin) · reconstruct reading order for two-column PDF layouts (#678) (#704) (@zoharbabin) · widen…
04 · Who maintains Web Researcher MCP
Web Researcher MCP is maintained by zoharbabin. We track 3 MCP servers from zoharbabin - 2 actively maintained, 98 combined GitHub stars, oldest repo from May 2025.
05 · Facts
- repository
- github.com/zoharbabin/web-researcher-mcp
- category
- web scraping - ranked #62 of 97 actively-maintained web scraping servers as of 2026-09-30.
- release cadence
- 10+ releases in the last 90 days (latest 2026-09-28)
- registry
- io.github.zoharbabin/web-researcher-mcp (active, first published 2026-05-19 · 72 versions)
- packages
- oci:ghcr.io/zoharbabin/web-researcher-mcp:1.49.4 · oci:docker.io/zoharbabin/web-researcher-mcp:1.49.4
06 · Web Researcher MCP FAQ
What is Web Researcher MCP?
Your AI research assistant that cites real sources and stays honest. Search the entire web or narrow it down to just the sites you trust; medical journals, court databases, news outlets, academic papers.
Is Web Researcher MCP still maintained?
Yes - as of 2026-09-30, its last commit was 2026-09-28 and it shipped 10+ releases in the last 90 days. We re-verify nightly.
How do I install Web Researcher MCP?
Run `docker run -i --rm ghcr.io/zoharbabin/web-researcher-mcp:1.49.4`. The README documents 12 environment variables (GOOGLE_CUSTOM_SEARCH_API_KEY, GOOGLE_CUSTOM_SEARCH_ID, SEARCH_PROVIDER…) to set first. Set GOOGLE_CUSTOM_SEARCH_API_KEY, GOOGLE_CUSTOM_SEARCH_ID, SEARCH_PROVIDER, BRAVE_API_KEY, INSTALL_DIR, SEARCH_ROUTING, SERPER_API_KEY, SEARXNG_URL, EXA_API_KEY, CUSTOM_LENSES_PATH, OAUTH_ISSUER_URL, OAUTH_AUDIENCE before connecting. You can also paste the ready-made client config above.
07 · Alternatives to Web Researcher MCP
Alternatives to Web Researcher MCP
Maintained web scraping servers if Web Researcher MCP isn't the fit.
- Apify MCP Server Extract data from any website with thousands of scrapers, crawlers, and automations on Apify Store ⚡ ★ 8,922 · 2026-09-29
- Firecrawl MCP Server MCP server for Firecrawl - web search, scraping, and biomedical/arXiv paper search. ★ 7,536 · 2026-09-30
- Exa Connect AI agents to Exa for web search, content fetching, and multi-step research. ★ 5,058 · 2026-09-23
- Tavily MCP MCP server for advanced web search using Tavily ★ 2,416 · 2026-09-29
- CRW Web Scraper Open-source web scraper for AI agents with scrape, crawl, and map tools ★ 1,088 · 2026-09-30
- Open Brand Extract brand assets (logos, colors, backdrop images, brand name) from any website URL ★ 799 · 2026-05-12
Pairs well with
Servers that cover what Web Researcher MCP doesn't - only shown when the pairing reason fits the companion.
- SearXNG Search → search companion search · ★ 1,268
- Server Search → search companion search · ★ 39,168
- Supabase → database companion database · ★ 2,926
- MongoDB MCP Server → database companion database · ★ 1,137
- Codebase Memory → memory companion memory · ★ 45,519
- Memorix → memory companion memory · ★ 819
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