What is the Hacker News MCP Server?

The Hacker News MCP Server gives you direct access to Hacker News content through your AI assistant. Instead of manually browsing the site, you can ask questions and retrieve stories, comments, and user profiles using natural language. This server connects to Hacker News's API and delivers structured data that's easy to work with and analyze.

Installation

To add the Hacker News MCP Server to your environment, you'll need to configure it in your MCP settings file. The server connects automatically to Hacker News—no API keys or authentication required.

Add the server configuration to your MCP settings, then restart your AI assistant. Once configured, the server runs in the background and responds to your queries about Hacker News content.

Basic Usage

After installation, you can immediately start querying Hacker News through natural conversation with your AI assistant. Here are some ways to get started:

Browsing Stories

Ask for current top stories to see what's trending on Hacker News right now. You can request new submissions to catch the latest posts, or ask for "best" stories that have proven valuable over time. Each story includes the title, URL, score, author, and submission time.

Reading Comments

Request comment threads for any story to dive into community discussions. Comments often contain expert insights and technical analysis that add significant value beyond the original article. You can explore entire conversation trees or focus on specific comments.

Looking Up Users

Query user profiles to see someone's contribution history, karma score, and activity patterns. This is useful for identifying subject matter experts or understanding who's influential in specific technical domains.

Practical Examples

You might ask your AI assistant questions like:

• "What are the top stories on Hacker News right now?"
• "Show me comments on the top story about AI"
• "What has user 'patio11' posted recently?"
• "Find discussions about Rust programming from the past week"

The server handles these requests automatically, retrieving and formatting the relevant data for you.

Tips for Best Results

Focus your queries on specific topics or timeframes to get the most relevant results. When exploring comments, start with highly-voted submissions since they typically generate the most insightful discussions. For research purposes, combining story data with comment analysis provides a fuller picture of community sentiment.

The server provides real-time data, so you're always working with current information from Hacker News's active community of technology professionals and enthusiasts.