Is there an official Hacker News MCP server?

Not from Y Combinator. Hacker News publishes a read-only Firebase API and Algolia runs a search API over it, and the community servers wrap one or the other. FishOut is not official either: it is a listening service that collects HN for your keywords and serves the results over MCP.

Can my assistant search all of Hacker News through FishOut?

No. FishOut returns what matched your keywords, from when you added them plus your plan’s backfill (2 days on Free). For an ad-hoc search of the whole archive, an Algolia-based server such as mcp-hn is the better tool, and nothing stops you running both.

How fresh are Hacker News results?

Every keyword is checked hourly on every plan. From Plus you can mark keywords as Fast, which checks Reddit, Hacker News and Bluesky every 15 minutes — the one to use on launch day, when a thread is effectively over within hours.

Will it post on Hacker News for me?

No. FishOut drafts a reply (from Plus) and stops; you post it from your own account. On HN a promotional reply does more damage than silence, which is why the draft is checked for disclosure and links before you see it.

Which assistants work with it?

Any client that connects to a remote Streamable HTTP server with OAuth or a custom header: Claude, Claude Code, ChatGPT in developer mode, Codex, Cursor, VS Code, Gemini CLI and more. Each has a setup page.

Hacker News · MCP server

The Hacker News MCP server that only returns what matters

The open-source Hacker News servers hand your assistant the front page. FishOut hands it the stories and comments that name you, your competitors or your problem, already read: a relevance, a label for what the author wants, and a call on whether to reply.

Remote MCP server · Streamable HTTP · OAuth

https://mcp.fishout.ai/mcp

Start free Prefer an inbox and alerts?

Free plan, checked hourly. Every 15 minutes on a Fast keyword, from Plus.

[01] ASK IT/ IN YOUR ASSISTANT

What a Hacker News question looks like

Fixture brands and handles; real filters. Open the call for its arguments.

Claude Code · terminalfishout · mcp

Anything on Hacker News this week where people are choosing a tool like ours?

list_mentionsread-onlyarguments

{
  "filter": {
    "platforms": [
      "hackernews"
    ],
    "from": "2026-10-13T00:00:00Z",
    "labels": [
      "asking-for-recommendations",
      "comparison"
    ],
    "sort": "best"
  },
  "limit": 5
}

Ask HNtidepool_dev3h

Ask HN: What do you use for transactional email in 2026?

Reply nowAsking for recommendations

Show HN: Relaymint SDK 2.0cobalt_ferry1d

Compares retry behaviour with two other providers

Reply, carefullyComparison

Ask HN: Self-hosting email again?ninebarrel2d

Mentions you in passing in a list of options

WatchDiscussion

Two worth your time. The Ask HN thread is three hours old and nobody from a vendor has answered; on HN, lead with the answer and leave the link out. The Show HN comment compares retries — reply only if you can add numbers. Want a draft for the first one?

[02] DIY SERVERS/ DATED

What else answers “hacker news mcp”

Search "hacker news mcp" and you find directories of small open-source servers. They are good at what they do: read the front page, open a thread, search the archive. None of them watches for you.

erithwik/mcp-hn

Needs: Nothing — no account, no key

stdio, 4 tools, Algolia HN Search API; MIT

paabloLC/mcp-hacker-news

Needs: Nothing

stdio, 11 tools over the official HN Firebase API; lists, items and users, no keyword search

pskill9/hn-server

Needs: Nothing

stdio, 1 tool that scrapes news.ycombinator.com; MIT

FishOut compared with A DIY server, feature by feature
	FishOut	A DIY server
Coverage
Where it runs	Advantage: Hosted at one URL; nothing to install	Behind: A local process your client starts (stdio)
What comes back	Advantage: Mentions of your keywords with relevance, labels and a Reply call	Behind: Raw stories, comments and search hits
Watching between questions	Advantage: Hourly, or every 15 minutes on a Fast keyword	Behind: Only when you ask
Search the whole HN archive, any term	Behind: Your keywords only, from when you added them (plus backfill)	Advantage: Yes, through Algolia (mcp-hn)
Other platforms in the same answer	Advantage: Reddit, Bluesky, GitHub, Google News and more	Behind: Hacker News only
Price
Price and source	Behind: Free plan; commercial, closed source	Advantage: Free and open source

[03] COVERAGE/ HACKER NEWS

Collected

Stories and comments, Ask HN and Show HN included, with the story title attached to any comment that matched — so a reply five levels deep still says what thread it is in.

How often

Free plan, checked hourly. Every 15 minutes on a Fast keyword, from Plus. Keyword shapes and competitor coverage: Hacker News monitoring.

[04] TOOLS/ ANNOTATED

The calls that matter here

5 of 115. “Asks first” marks a destructive hint.

ToolWhat it does hereArguments

list_mentionsread-only
The HN slice of your inbox. Sort by newest during a launch, by best the rest of the week.
filter: {"platforms":["hackernews"],"sort":"newest"}
get_mentionread-only
Opens one match with the comment branch above it, which HN needs more than anywhere.
—
create_keywordwrite
Adds a keyword; set fast on launch day for a 15-minute check.
term: "Relaymint", kind: "brand", platforms: ["hackernews"], fast: true
request_reply_draftwrite
A draft in a technical register, checked before you see it. From Plus.
tone: "technical"
record_feedbackasks first
Teaches FishOut that a match was not about you, so the next one is filtered.
kind: "not_relevant"

[05] CONNECT/ ONE URL

Pick your assistant

OAuth sign-in; no key to paste.

bash

claude mcp add --transport http fishout https://mcp.fishout.ai/mcp

Then run /mcp, choose fishout and authenticate in the browser.

Claude Code guide

[06] WHAT TO ASK/ HACKER NEWS

Five Hacker News prompts

Longer jobs are playbooks.

prompts

1What did Hacker News say about us since Monday, best first?
2Find Show HN threads this month where someone compares us with a competitor.
3Which HN comments labelled Has a problem are still unanswered?
4Make our product name a Fast keyword for tomorrow’s launch.
5Draft a technical reply to the top Ask HN thread. I will post it myself.

[07] IN THE APP/ INBOX

And when you would rather look than ask

“Ask HN: What do you use for transactional email in 2026?”, opened in the inbox.

Views

Reply now6

Leads14

Switchers5

Support9

Filtered212

Saved views

Hacker News this week

Reply now· Best first6

Ask HNtidepool_dev3h

Ask HN: What do you use for transactional email in 2026?

Reply nowAsking for recommendations

Show HN: Relaymint SDK 2.0cobalt_ferry1d

Compares retry behaviour with two other providers

Reply, carefullyComparison

Ask HN: Self-hosting email again?ninebarrel2d

Mentions you in passing in a list of options

WatchDiscussion

Ask HNtidepool_dev3h

Ask HN: What do you use for transactional email in 2026?

Our provider keeps landing password resets in spam. What are people running now, and what do you wish you had known before switching?

Relevance

Matches your briefAsking for helpNot answered yet

Labels · Reply call

Reply nowAsking for recommendations

Answer first, no link

Draft reply

Spam-foldered resets are usually a DNS problem before they are a provider problem: check SPF, DKIM and DMARC alignment first. I work on Relaymint, so discount accordingly — the thing I would ask any provider is how they handle bounces.