Unusual Whales MCP

Inspired by erikmaday/unusual-whales-mcp - the original community MCP server for Unusual Whales by Erik Maday.

The official Unusual Whales MCP server. Connect any MCP-compatible client to 100+ market data endpoints covering options flow, dark pool, congressional trading, Greek exposure, volatility, and more.

Quick Start

1. Get an API Key

Get your key at unusualwhales.com/settings/api-dashboard.

2. Connect

Remote (recommended) — no install, connects to the hosted endpoint:

# Claude Code
claude mcp add --transport http unusualwhales \
  https://api.unusualwhales.com/api/mcp \
  --header "Authorization: Bearer YOUR_KEY"

// Claude Desktop (~/Library/Application Support/Claude/claude_desktop_config.json on macOS)
{
  "mcpServers": {
    "unusualwhales": {
      "command": "npx",
      "args": [
        "-y",
        "mcp-remote",
        "https://api.unusualwhales.com/api/mcp",
        "--header",
        "Authorization: Bearer YOUR_KEY"
      ]
    }
  }
}

Claude Desktop does not natively support remote MCP servers yet, so we use mcp-remote to bridge the connection. Requires Node.js 18+.

// Cursor (~/.cursor/mcp.json)
{
  "mcpServers": {
    "unusualwhales": {
      "type": "url",
      "url": "https://api.unusualwhales.com/api/mcp",
      "headers": {
        "Authorization": "Bearer YOUR_KEY"
      }
    }
  }
}

// VS Code (.vscode/mcp.json) — uses "servers" instead of "mcpServers"
{
  "servers": {
    "unusualwhales": {
      "type": "url",
      "url": "https://api.unusualwhales.com/api/mcp",
      "headers": {
        "Authorization": "Bearer YOUR_KEY"
      }
    }
  }
}

// Windsurf (~/.codeium/windsurf/mcp_config.json) — uses "serverUrl" instead of "url"
{
  "mcpServers": {
    "unusualwhales": {
      "serverUrl": "https://api.unusualwhales.com/api/mcp",
      "headers": {
        "Authorization": "Bearer YOUR_KEY"
      }
    }
  }
}

After adding the config, fully quit and reopen your AI assistant. Just saving the file is not enough — the MCP server connects at startup.

# Claude Code
claude mcp add unusualwhales -e UW_API_KEY=YOUR_KEY -- npx -y @unusualwhales/mcp

// Claude Desktop, Cursor
{
  "mcpServers": {
    "unusualwhales": {
      "command": "npx",
      "args": ["-y", "@unusualwhales/mcp"],
      "env": {
        "UW_API_KEY": "YOUR_KEY"
      }
    }
  }
}

// VS Code (.vscode/mcp.json)
{
  "servers": {
    "unusualwhales": {
      "command": "npx",
      "args": ["-y", "@unusualwhales/mcp"],
      "env": {
        "UW_API_KEY": "YOUR_KEY"
      }
    }
  }
}

Config file locations:

• Claude Desktop (macOS): ~/Library/Application Support/Claude/claude_desktop_config.json
• Claude Desktop (Windows): %APPDATA%\Claude\claude_desktop_config.json
• Cursor: .cursor/mcp.json or ~/.cursor/mcp.json
• VS Code: .vscode/mcp.json
• Windsurf: ~/.codeium/windsurf/mcp_config.json

Troubleshooting

| Problem | Fix | |---------|-----| | Server not connecting | Make sure the URL is exactly https://api.unusualwhales.com/api/mcp. Common mistake: using unusualwhales.com/public-api/mcp (that's the docs page, not the server). | | Tools not appearing | Fully quit and reopen your client after adding the config. Verify your JSON has no trailing commas. | | 401 Unauthorized | Check your API key is correct and active. Remote config needs "Authorization: Bearer YOUR_KEY" in the --header arg. Local config needs UW_API_KEY in env. | | npx not found (nvm users) | Claude Desktop doesn't inherit your shell PATH. Use the full path to npx in the command field (e.g. /Users/you/.nvm/versions/node/v20.x.x/bin/npx) and add "env": { "PATH": "/Users/you/.nvm/versions/node/v20.x.x/bin:/usr/local/bin:/usr/bin:/bin" }. |

3. Ask Questions

Once connected, just ask about the market in natural language:

What's the options flow for AAPL today?
Show me the latest congressional trades
What's the dark pool activity for TSLA?
Get the max pain for SPY options expiring this Friday
Deep dive on NVDA - options, dark pool, insider activity

Tools

The server exposes tools across 15 data categories. Your MCP client will call them automatically based on your questions.

| Category | Examples | |----------|----------| | Stock | Options chains, Greeks, IV rank, OHLC candles, max pain, OI, volatility | | Options | Contract flow, historic prices, intraday data, volume profiles | | Flow | Options flow alerts, full tape, net flow by expiry, sector flow | | Dark Pool | Transactions with NBBO context, price level filtering | | Congress | Congressional trades, late filings, individual member activity | | Politicians (Premium) | Portfolios, recent trades, holdings by ticker — contact support to upgrade | | Insider | Insider transactions, sector flow, ticker flow | | Institutions | 13F filings, holdings, sector exposure, ownership changes | | Market | Market tide, sector tide, economic calendar, FDA calendar, correlations | | Earnings | Premarket and afterhours schedules, historical earnings | | ETF | Holdings, exposure, inflows/outflows, sector weights | | Shorts | Short interest, FTDs, short volume ratio, borrow rates | | Seasonality | Monthly performers, yearly patterns, historical seasonality | | Screener | Stock screener, options screener, analyst ratings | | News | Market news headlines |

Public Stock Fundamentals and Technicals

The MCP now includes public-style stock tools that map directly to the stock fundamentals and technical indicator endpoints.

| Tool | What it returns | |------|------------------| | get_fundamental_breakdown | Filing-based fundamentals, revenue segmentation, EPS, dividends, and balance-sheet trends | | get_stock_financials | Combined financials payload with income statements, balance sheets, cash flows, and earnings | | get_income_statements | Income statement history with optional report_type filter | | get_balance_sheets | Balance sheet history with optional report_type filter | | get_cash_flows | Cash flow history with optional report_type filter | | get_earnings_history | Historical reported/estimated EPS and earnings surprises with optional report_type filter | | get_technical_indicator | Indicator series for SMA, EMA, RSI, MACD, BBANDS, STOCH, ADX, ATR, OBV, VWAP, CCI, WILLR, AROON, and MFI |

The grouped local-package tools uw_fundamentals and uw_technicals remain available for clients that prefer the existing action-based interface.

Prompts

The server includes 30+ ready-to-use analysis prompts. Ask to use any prompt by name.

| Prompt | What it does | |--------|-------------| | daily-summary | Market overview with tide, sectors, flow, dark pool | | morning-briefing | Morning tide, earnings, and key activity | | end-of-day-recap | EOD top movers, sectors, and themes | | weekly-expiration | Max pain, gamma, and OI for weekly expiry | | top-movers | Top tickers by net premium and options impact |

| Prompt | What it does | |--------|-------------| | ticker-analysis | Deep dive: options, dark pool, insiders, catalysts | | options-setup | IV rank, term structure, max pain analysis | | pre-earnings | Historical moves, IV, positioning before earnings | | greek-exposure | Gamma, delta, vanna exposure by strike | | short-interest | Short interest, FTDs, squeeze potential | | option-contract | Deep dive on a specific option contract | | correlation-analysis | Cross-ticker correlation analysis |

| Prompt | What it does | |--------|-------------| | unusual-flow | Scan for unusual options activity | | dark-pool-scanner | Large dark pool prints and institutional activity | | sector-flow | Options flow sentiment by sector group |

| Prompt | What it does | |--------|-------------| | congress-tracker | Recent congressional trading with patterns | | politician-portfolio | Portfolio holdings for a specific politician | | insider-scanner | Insider buying/selling patterns | | institutional-activity | 13F filings, holdings changes, sector rotation | | analyst-tracker | Analyst ratings with options flow correlation |

| Prompt | What it does | |--------|-------------| | earnings-calendar | Earnings with IV and expected moves | | fda-calendar | FDA events with biotech options activity | | economic-calendar | FOMC, CPI, jobs data with positioning |

| Prompt | What it does | |--------|-------------| | iv-screener | High/low IV rank stocks for options strategies | | bullish-confluence | Bullish flow + dark pool + insider buying | | bearish-confluence | Bearish flow + distribution + insider selling | | news-scanner | Headlines with related options flow | | seasonality | Historical seasonal patterns | | etf-flow | ETF inflows/outflows and exposure |

Chain prompts for deeper analysis:

Use morning-briefing, then unusual-flow to dig into top movers
Use pre-earnings for NVDA, then greek-exposure to see dealer positioning
Use bullish-confluence to find candidates, then ticker-analysis on the top result

Configuration

All optional. The defaults work for most users.

| Variable | Default | Description | |----------|---------|-------------| | UW_API_KEY | required | Your Unusual Whales API key | | UW_RATE_LIMIT_PER_MINUTE | 120 | Max requests per minute | | UW_MAX_RETRIES | 3 | Retry attempts for failed requests | | UW_CIRCUIT_BREAKER_THRESHOLD | 5 | Failures before circuit opens | | UW_CIRCUIT_BREAKER_RESET_TIMEOUT | 30000 | Ms before retrying after circuit opens | | LOG_LEVEL | info | Logging verbosity (debug, info, warn, error) |

Contributing

See CONTRIBUTING.md.

Acknowledgments

This project builds on the foundational work of Erik Maday, whose unusual-whales-mcp was the first community MCP server for Unusual Whales and demonstrated how to bring market data into the MCP ecosystem.

License

MIT - see LICENSE.

Originally inspired by the UW community MCP erikmaday/unusual-whales-mcp.