Wikipedia MCP Server

A Model Context Protocol (MCP) server for searching and retrieving Wikipedia articles using TypeScript.

Quick Start

Make sure to set up your environment variables first:

• WIKIPEDIA_USER_AGENT (optional, default: Wikipedia-MCP/1.0 (https://github.com/user/wikipedia-mcp; [email protected]))
• WIKIPEDIA_LANGUAGE (optional, default: 'en')
• WIKIPEDIA_REQUEST_DELAY (optional, default: 1000ms)
• WIKIPEDIA_TIMEOUT (optional, default: 30000ms)

Installation

1. Using with Claude Desktop

Add the server config to your Claude Desktop configuration file:

For NPX Installation from GitHub (on Windows)

"wikipedia-mcp": {
  "command": "cmd",
  "args": [
    "/k",
    "npx",
    "-y",
    "@tan-yong-sheng/wikipedia-mcp"
  ],
  "env": {
    "WIKIPEDIA_USER_AGENT": "MyApp/1.0 (https://mywebsite.com; [email protected])",
    "WIKIPEDIA_LANGUAGE": "en",
    "WIKIPEDIA_REQUEST_DELAY": "1000"
  }
}

For NPX Installation from GitHub (on Linux/macOS)

"wikipedia-mcp": {
  "command": "npx",
  "args": [
    "-y",
    "@tan-yong-sheng/wikipedia-mcp"
  ],
  "env": {
    "WIKIPEDIA_USER_AGENT": "MyApp/1.0 (https://mywebsite.com; [email protected])",
    "WIKIPEDIA_LANGUAGE": "en",
    "WIKIPEDIA_REQUEST_DELAY": "1000"
  }
}

For Development (on Windows/Linux/macOS)

cd /path/to/wikipedia-mcp
npm run build

"wikipedia-mcp": {
  "command": "node",
  "args": [
    "/path/to/wikipedia-mcp/dist/index.js"
  ],
  "env": {
    "WIKIPEDIA_USER_AGENT": "MyApp/1.0 (https://mywebsite.com; [email protected])",
    "WIKIPEDIA_LANGUAGE": "en",
    "WIKIPEDIA_REQUEST_DELAY": "1000",
    "WIKIPEDIA_TIMEOUT": "30000"
  }
}

Location of the configuration file:

• Windows: %APPDATA%/Claude/claude_desktop_config.json
• MacOS: ~/Library/Application Support/Claude/claude_desktop_config.json

Source: This server uses the MediaWiki Action API

Available Tools

The server provides the following tools for Wikipedia research:

Search Tools

• search_wikipedia - Search Wikipedia articles with customizable result limits
  • Find articles by keyword, topic, or phrase
  • Parameters: query (string), limit (number, optional, default: 10)
  • Returns: Article titles, snippets, page IDs, word counts, sizes, timestamps, and URLs

Content Retrieval Tools

• get_summary - Get concise page summaries with metadata

  • Retrieve article introductions with images and coordinates
  • Parameters: title (string)
  • Returns: Extract, thumbnail image, page ID, URL, and geographic coordinates (if available)

• get_article - Get full article content

  • Access complete Wikipedia article text
  • Parameters: title (string)
  • Returns: Full article content with page ID and metadata

Navigation Tools

• get_sections - Get page section outline/table of contents

  • Discover article structure and organization
  • Parameters: title (string)
  • Returns: Hierarchical section listing with numbers and titles

• get_links - Get links from page to other Wikipedia articles

  • Explore related articles and references
  • Parameters: title (string)
  • Returns: List of linked Wikipedia articles with URLs

Discovery Tools

• get_related_topics - Get related links and categories from a page with summaries
  • Find topics related to a Wikipedia page through its links and categories
  • Parameters: title (string), limit (number, optional, default: 10)
  • Returns: Related links with summaries and categories, up to specified limit

Example Queries

Research & Discovery

• "Search for articles about 'machine learning' and show me the top 5 results"
• "Get a summary of the 'Artificial Intelligence' Wikipedia page"
• "Show me the table of contents for the 'Climate Change' article"
• "Find all the links from the 'Python programming language' page"
• "Get related topics for 'anwar ibrahim' with summaries"

Content Access

• "Get the full content of the 'Quantum Computing' Wikipedia article"
• "Search for 'renewable energy' and get summaries of the first 3 results"
• "Show me the structure of the 'World War II' article"

Case-Insensitive Access

• "Get summary for 'anwar ibrahim'" (automatically finds 'Anwar Ibrahim')
• "Get article content for 'quantum computing'" (automatically finds correct capitalization)
• "Get sections for 'climate change'" (works with any case variation)
• "Get links from 'python programming language'" (handles case sensitivity)
• Works with any title variations - the server uses search fallback for exact matches

Multilingual Research

• "Search French Wikipedia for 'intelligence artificielle'" (set WIKIPEDIA_LANGUAGE=fr)
• "Get the Spanish summary for 'cambio climático'" (set WIKIPEDIA_LANGUAGE=es)

Configuration

Configure the server using environment variables:

| Variable | Default | Description | |----------|---------|-------------| | WIKIPEDIA_USER_AGENT | Wikipedia-MCP/1.0 (https://github.com/tan-yong-sheng/wikipedia-mcp; [email protected]) | User agent for API requests | | WIKIPEDIA_LANGUAGE | en | Wikipedia language edition (en, es, fr, de, etc.) | | WIKIPEDIA_REQUEST_DELAY | 1000 | Delay between requests in milliseconds | | WIKIPEDIA_TIMEOUT | 30000 | Request timeout in milliseconds |

Example Configuration

export WIKIPEDIA_USER_AGENT="MyApp/1.0 (https://mywebsite.com; [email protected])"
export WIKIPEDIA_LANGUAGE="en"
export WIKIPEDIA_REQUEST_DELAY="1500"

Features

• Search Wikipedia: Search for articles with customizable result limits
• Get Page Summary: Retrieve concise summaries of Wikipedia pages
• Get Full Content: Access complete article content
• Get Page Sections: Get section outline/table of contents
• Get Page Links: Get links from pages to other Wikipedia articles
• Get Related Topics: Get related links and categories with summaries
• Case-Insensitive Access: Automatic fallback to search API for title variations
• Rate Limiting: Built-in request throttling to respect Wikipedia's API limits
• Configurable: Environment variable support for customization
• Multilingual: Support for all Wikipedia language editions

API Reference

This server uses the MediaWiki Action API exclusively (/w/api.php):

• Search: action=query&list=search for article search
• Summary: action=query&prop=extracts|pageimages|coordinates for page summaries
• Content: action=query&prop=extracts for full article content
• Sections: action=parse&prop=sections for page section outline
• Links: action=query&prop=links for page links
• Related Topics: action=query&prop=links|categories for related content

Rate Limiting

The server implements automatic rate limiting to respect Wikipedia's API guidelines:

• Minimum 1-second delay between requests (configurable)
• Proper User-Agent headers
• Timeout handling

Error Handling

The server provides detailed error messages for common issues:

• Network timeouts
• Invalid page titles
• API rate limiting
• Server errors

Development

If you want to contribute or modify the server:

# Clone the repository
git clone https://github.com/tan-yong-sheng/wikipedia-mcp.git

# Install dependencies
npm install

# Build the server
npm run build

# For development with auto-rebuild
npm run watch

# Clean build directory
npm run clean

# Development mode
npm run dev

Contributing

Contributions are welcome! Please feel free to open an issue or submit a pull request.

License

MIT