MCP Scholarly MCP Server

A MCP server to search for accurate academic articles. More scholarly vendors will be added soon.

Local serverstdio

What is the MCP Scholarly MCP server?

MCP Scholarly becomes available to MCP clients through the mcp scholarly mcp server. A MCP server to search for accurate academic articles. More scholarly vendors will be added soon.

What MCP Scholarly does

A MCP server to search for accurate academic articles. More scholarly vendors will be added soon.

Tools it exposes

Once connected, the assistant can call these 3 tools directly:

  • search-arxiv — Search arxiv for articles related to the given keyword
  • Tools — The server implements one tool: - search-arxiv: Search arxiv for articles related to the given keyword. - Takes "keyword" as required string arguments
  • Debugging — Since MCP servers run over stdio, debugging can be challenging. For the best debugging experience, we strongly recommend using the [MCP

Installing the mcp scholarly mcp server

The server is distributed via npm as @smithery/cli, so most clients can run it without a manual build step. Add it to your MCP client's configuration and restart the client to pick it up — the copy-paste configs for Claude Desktop, Claude Code and Cursor are on this page.

Configuration

Before the server will start you need to supply one environment variable: UV_PUBLISH_TOKEN. Keep credentials in your client's env block or a secrets manager rather than committing them.

Where it fits

Developer-tool servers are usually the first ones people connect, because they turn "help me with this code" into an assistant that can actually read the repo and act on it. MCP Scholarly sits in that group, and the shape of its toolset — search-arxiv, Tools, Debugging — tells you what it is really for. Worth comparing against the other developer tools servers in this directory before you commit to one, since several overlap in scope but differ sharply in setup cost and permissions.

Practical notes

  • This server runs locally, so it operates with whatever access your machine and its credentials already have. Scope that deliberately rather than by default.
  • It will not start until its required credentials are present, so set those before wondering why the tools never appear.
  • Maintained by ywwAHU.
  • MCP clients ask for confirmation before each tool call by default. Keep that on while you learn what the mcp scholarly mcp server actually does with your data.
  • Every entry in this directory is reviewed by hand before it goes live, and details are checked against the project's own documentation.

Available tools

ToolWhat it does
search-arxivSearch arxiv for articles related to the given keyword.
ToolsThe server implements one tool: - search-arxiv: Search arxiv for articles related to the given keyword. - Takes "keyword" as required string arguments
DebuggingSince MCP servers run over stdio, debugging can be challenging. For the best debugging experience, we strongly recommend using the [MCP Inspector](https://github.com/modelcontextprotocol/inspector).

How to install the MCP Scholarly MCP server

"mcpServers": {
    "mcp-scholarly": {
      "command": "uv",
      "args": [
        "--directory",
        "/Users/adityakarnam/PycharmProjects/mcp-scholarly/mcp-scholarly",
        "run",
        "mcp-scholarly"
      ]
    }
  }

Configuration as documented by the project. Restart the client after saving.

Configuration

VariableDescriptionRequired
UV_PUBLISH_TOKENCredential the server authenticates with.Yes

Example prompts to try

  • Use MCP Scholarly to search-arxiv.
  • Use MCP Scholarly to Tools.
  • Use MCP Scholarly to Debugging.

Frequently asked questions

It connects MCP Scholarly to MCP-compatible AI assistants such as Claude and Cursor, exposing 3 tools (search-arxiv, Tools, Debugging) that the assistant can call on your behalf. Instead of copying data back and forth by hand, the assistant works with MCP Scholarly directly.