Overview

The Hacker News MCP Server offers three primary methods for retrieving stories: Top Stories, New Stories, and Best Stories. Each feed serves a distinct purpose and surfaces different content based on how the Hacker News community engages with submissions. Understanding these differences will help you access the most relevant information for your needs.

Top Stories

Top Stories represent the current front page of Hacker News—the submissions that are actively trending right now. These stories have earned their position through a combination of upvotes and recency, reflecting what the community finds most engaging at this moment.

When you retrieve Top Stories, you'll see a mix of recently submitted content that's gaining traction quickly and slightly older posts that have accumulated significant support. This feed changes frequently throughout the day as new submissions compete for attention and older ones gradually decline in ranking.

Best for: Staying current with breaking tech news, identifying trending discussions, and understanding what's capturing the community's immediate attention.

New Stories

New Stories shows the most recently submitted content to Hacker News, ordered chronologically regardless of votes or engagement. This feed gives you an unfiltered view of everything being posted to the platform as it arrives.

Because New Stories don't require community validation to appear, you'll encounter a wider variety of quality and relevance. Many submissions here will never gain significant traction, but this feed is where every future top story begins its journey.

Best for: Discovering content before it trends, monitoring specific topics as they're submitted, and getting the earliest possible view of emerging discussions.

Best Stories

Best Stories represents content that has demonstrated sustained value and quality over time. This feed uses a more sophisticated algorithm than Top Stories, considering factors like discussion quality, longevity of engagement, and overall community reception to identify truly exceptional submissions.

Think of Best Stories as a curated selection of the most worthwhile content from recent days. These submissions have proven their value through meaningful engagement rather than just initial popularity.

Best for: Finding high-quality content for research, identifying significant discussions worth deep analysis, and discovering well-vetted resources without noise.

Choosing the Right Feed

Select Top Stories when you want to pulse-check the community's current interests. Choose New Stories when timing matters and you need early visibility. Use Best Stories when quality and substance are more important than immediacy.

You can also combine these approaches—start with Best Stories for substantial content, then check Top Stories for current trends, and monitor New Stories for breaking developments in specific areas of interest.