Exa Search

Neural search for web content, code, companies, and people via the Exa MCP server.

When to Activate

• User needs current web information or news
• Searching for code examples, API docs, or technical references
• Researching companies, competitors, or market players
• Finding professional profiles or people in a domain
• Running background research for any development task
• User says "search for", "look up", "find", or "what's the latest on"

MCP Requirement

Exa MCP server must be configured. Add to ~/.claude.json:

"exa-web-search": {
  "command": "npx",
  "args": ["-y", "exa-mcp-server"],
  "env": { "EXA_API_KEY": "YOUR_EXA_API_KEY_HERE" }
}

Get an API key at exa.ai.

Core Tools

web_search_exa

General web search for current information, news, or facts.

web_search_exa(query: "latest AI developments 2026", numResults: 5)

Parameters:

Param	Type	Default	Notes
query	string	required	Search query
numResults	number	8	Number of results

web_search_advanced_exa

Filtered search with domain and date constraints.

web_search_advanced_exa(
  query: "React Server Components best practices",
  numResults: 5,
  includeDomains: ["github.com", "react.dev"],
  startPublishedDate: "2025-01-01"
)

Parameters:

Param	Type	Default	Notes
query	string	required	Search query
numResults	number	8	Number of results
includeDomains	string[]	none	Limit to specific domains
excludeDomains	string[]	none	Exclude specific domains
startPublishedDate	string	none	ISO date filter (start)
endPublishedDate	string	none	ISO date filter (end)

get_code_context_exa

Find code examples and documentation from GitHub, Stack Overflow, and docs sites.

get_code_context_exa(query: "Python asyncio patterns", tokensNum: 3000)