Hacker News MCP. Audit tech trends and community discussions instantly.
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Hacker News MCP Server. Get the latest tech news, track trends, and read deep discussions directly in your chat. Fetch the top stories, see new submissions, or read any specific item's full comment thread—all without leaving your AI client.
What your AI agents can do
Get item
Reads the full content of a specific Hacker News item (story, comment, or poll) using its ID.
New stories
Fetches the list of most recently submitted stories on Hacker News.
Top stories
Retrieves the current list of most popular stories from the Hacker News front page.
Retrieves the current list of most popular stories from the Hacker News front page, including titles, scores, and author info.
Gets a chronological list of the most recently submitted stories on Hacker News.
Reads the full content of a specific Hacker News item (story, comment, or poll) using its unique numeric ID.
Ask AI about this MCP
Supported MCP Clients
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Hacker News MCP Server: 3 Tools for Tech News Analysis
These tools let your agent fetch the top stories, newest submissions, or the detailed content of any specific item on Hacker News.
019d75adget item
Reads the full content of a specific Hacker News item (story, comment, or poll) using its ID.
019d75adnew stories
Fetches the list of most recently submitted stories on Hacker News.
019d75adtop stories
Retrieves the current list of most popular stories from the Hacker News front page.
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What you can do with this MCP connector
You gotta connect this server to your AI client. It lets you get the latest tech news, track what's hot on Hacker News, and read deep discussions right from your chat. You can pull the top stories, check out new posts, or grab the full comment thread for any specific item—all without leaving your agent window.
When you use this server, your AI client talks to the Hacker News API. You get structured data—like titles, scores, and authors—and complex discussions come back as clean Markdown. It's built for people who need to analyze community sentiment or track tech trends without messing around in a browser.
If you wanna see what's popular, use top_stories to pull the current list of most popular stories from the Hacker News front page, giving you the title, score, and author for each. To see what's fresh, run new_stories to get a chronological list of the most recently submitted stories. When you need to read the full scoop on anything—whether it's a story, a comment, or a poll—you just use get_item with the item's unique ID to read its full content.
How Hacker News MCP Works
- 1 1. Subscribe to the Hacker News MCP Server on Vinkius.
- 2 2. Your AI client calls one of the available tools (e.g.,
top_stories). - 3 3. The server executes the request, pulling the structured data (like top titles or a specific comment thread) and sending it back to your client.
The bottom line is that you talk to your agent, and the agent uses the tools to get the data from Hacker News, skipping the need to open a browser.
Who Is Hacker News MCP For?
Engineers, researchers, and product managers who spend too much time manually browsing tech forums. If you need to monitor industry trends, audit community sentiment, or keep a finger on the pulse of the open-source world without clicking through ten tabs, this is for you.
Checks the top stories via top_stories to see if a new library or framework mentioned in the community is gaining traction before starting a side project.
Uses get_item to pull the full text of a recent product launch discussion to gauge community reception and find key feature requests.
Runs new_stories to track niche or specialized technical topics, ensuring they don't miss cutting-edge research announcements.
What Changes When You Connect
- Analyze trends without leaving your chat. Instead of manually visiting Hacker News, you just ask your agent to run
top_storiesand get the current top 5 list, complete with scores and titles. - Get deep context from comments. When you run
get_item, you don't just get a link; you get the full discussion thread, cleaned up into Markdown so your agent can actually read the nuance. - Never miss a launch. Use
new_storiesto pull a chronological list of the latest submissions. This is perfect for tracking new open-source databases or niche tech announcements. - Stop clicking through pages. Instead of opening the website and reading comment by comment, you use
get_itemto pull the whole discussion for a specific ID in one go. - See story metadata instantly. Running
top_storiesgives you more than just a title; you get the author, the score, and the submission time, all in one data block.
Real-World Use Cases
Monitoring a Competitor's Launch
A PM needs to know how the community reacted to a rival's new API. They ask their agent to run get_item using the specific item ID. The agent returns the entire discussion, allowing the PM to summarize sentiment and identify key feature gaps without reading hundreds of comments.
Catching the Latest Open-Source Project
An engineer wants to know what's been posted to the tech world in the last hour. They run new_stories to get a list of recent submissions, quickly identifying promising 'Show HN' posts and tracking potential new libraries.
Quickly Grabbing Market Consensus
A developer needs a quick pulse check on the biggest tech debates. They run top_stories to get the top 5 list. This gives them immediate context on what the industry is currently focused on, saving the manual step of checking the front page.
Auditing a Specific Technical Debate
A researcher needs to understand the nuances of a specific memory safety debate. They use get_item with the relevant ID. The agent extracts the full, clean comment thread, letting the researcher analyze the arguments without formatting distractions.
The Tradeoffs
Manual Browsing
Opening Hacker News in a browser, clicking through the top 10 stories, and then manually copying and pasting key quotes or links into a document.
→
Use top_stories to get the list, then use get_item on the specific ID you care about. Your agent handles the whole flow: get the list, pick the ID, and fetch the content.
Over-relying on Search
Asking the AI client to 'find articles about AI' without specifying a date or scope, resulting in too much noise and general links.
→
Use new_stories for chronological data or top_stories for current consensus. This limits the scope and gives you actionable, time-bound results.
Sequential Calls
Asking the agent to 'give me top stories, then new stories, then details for ID X' as three separate, disconnected requests.
→ Think of the task as one goal. Use a single prompt: 'Give me the top 3 stories, and then the full comments for the one with the highest score.' The agent manages the sequence for you.
When It Fits, When It Doesn't
Use this server if your job requires reading structured tech news, tracking community sentiment, or auditing deep discussion threads. If you need to know what's hot right now, use top_stories. If you need to track novelty, use new_stories. If you need the full context of one specific debate, run get_item. Don't use this if your goal is general web searching or accessing non-tech, non-discussion content. For those, use a general search or document retrieval tool.
Independent Platform Disclaimer: Vinkius is an independent platform and is not affiliated with, endorsed by, sponsored by, verified by, or otherwise authorized by Hacker News. All third-party trademarks, logos, and brand names are the property of their respective owners. Their use on this website is strictly for informational purposes to identify service compatibility and interoperability.
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Works with Claude, ChatGPT, Cursor, and more
The Model Context Protocol standardizes how applications expose capabilities to LLMs. Instead of operating in isolation, your AI gains direct access to external platforms, live data, and real-world actions through secure, standardized connections.
This server provides 3 capabilities that interface natively with Claude, ChatGPT, Cursor, and any MCP client. No middleware. No custom integration required.
Available Capabilities
Manually tracking tech trends across multiple tabs is a nightmare.
Today, monitoring tech news means opening the browser, navigating to Hacker News, and clicking through the front page. You scroll past dozens of stories, trying to keep track of which one is popular, which one is new, and which one is worth reading. You end up with a pile of links and vague summaries.
With the Hacker News MCP Server, your agent pulls the list of top stories and new submissions directly into the chat. You get structured data—titles, scores, and links—without the visual clutter. You just read the facts.
Use the Hacker News MCP Server to get full item context.
The manual process for deep dives is terrible. You find a story, click the link, scroll down, and then try to copy the discussion. The HTML mess is a nightmare, and you often miss key comments because of formatting or pagination.
Now, you run `get_item` and your agent gives you the entire discussion thread, perfectly cleaned up in Markdown. You can analyze the full conversation immediately.
Common Questions About Hacker News MCP
How do I use the `top_stories` tool to find trending tech news? +
Just tell your agent to use top_stories. It pulls the current list of most popular articles, giving you the titles, scores, and authors right in the chat.
Can I use `get_item` for a comment, or only for the main story? +
You can use get_item for either. It fetches the full content of any specific item, whether it's the main story, a comment, or a poll, using its numeric ID.
What's the difference between `top_stories` and `new_stories`? +
top_stories shows what's popular right now. new_stories shows what was submitted most recently, helping you track the very latest content.
Does the Hacker News MCP Server require an API key? +
No. The server uses a public API, so you don't need to worry about authentication or keys. It just works.
How does the `get_item` tool handle comments versus stories? +
The get_item tool reads the full context for any item type by its ID. It converts all HTML comments into clean Markdown, allowing your agent to process structured conversations regardless of whether the source is a story, comment, or poll.
What if I need to check multiple items? Can I chain tools? +
Yes, your AI client can chain tools together. You can use top_stories to get IDs, then pass those IDs to get_item for detailed content retrieval. This lets you audit multiple discussions in a single session.
Are there any limits on how many stories I can fetch using `top_stories`? +
The server handles fetching current top stories natively. While specific limits aren't published, the tool is designed for high-volume reading of top-ranking content and community debates.
Can I use the `new_stories` tool to track specific tech keywords? +
The new_stories tool fetches the most recent chronological submissions. You must filter the resulting titles or content keywords yourself, but the tool provides the raw data stream for you to search through.
Can my agent fetch the latest news from Hacker News without an API key? +
Yes. This server uses the public Hacker News API, which does not require authentication. You can start exploring stories and comments immediately after subscribing.
How do I read comments for a specific HN story via chat? +
Use the 'get_item' tool. Provide the story's numeric ID. The agent will retrieve the detailed contents including all top-level comments, converted cleanly from HTML to Markdown for easy reading.
Can I see the most recent submissions instead of just the top stories? +
Absolutely. Use the 'new_stories' tool. This retrieves the most recently submitted stories chronologically, allowing you to track cutting-edge updates and launches in real-time.
Use it with your favorite AI tools
Connect this server to Cursor, Claude, VS Code, and more.
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