Substack MCP

An MCP (Model Context Protocol) server for Substack API integration with Claude and other AI assistants.

Overview

This project implements a Model Context Protocol (MCP) server that enables AI assistants like Claude to interact with Substack newsletters, posts, and authors through a standardized interface. It leverages the Substack API library and makes its functionality available through MCP.

With this MCP server, Claude can:

• Retrieve newsletter posts, podcasts, and recommendations
• Get post content and metadata
• Search for posts within newsletters
• Get user profile information and subscriptions

Installation

Prerequisites

• Python 3.10 or higher
• Claude for Desktop (for testing)

Setup

1. Clone this repository:

   git clone https://github.com/Greg-Swiftomatic/substack-mcp.git
   cd substack-mcp

2. Set up a virtual environment using uv:

   curl -LsSf https://astral.sh/uv/install.sh | sh  # Install uv if not already installed
   uv init .
   uv venv
   source .venv/bin/activate  # On Windows: .venv\Scripts\activate

3. Install dependencies:

   uv add "mcp[cli]" substack-api

Usage

Running the Server

Run the MCP server:

python substack_mcp.py

Configuring Claude for Desktop

1. Open Claude for Desktop's configuration file:

   • macOS/Linux: ~/Library/Application Support/Claude/claude_desktop_config.json
   • Windows: %APPDATA%\Claude\claude_desktop_config.json

2. Add your server configuration:

   {
       "mcpServers": {
           "substack": {
               "command": "uv",
               "args": [
                   "--directory",
                   "/ABSOLUTE/PATH/TO/substack-mcp",
                   "run",
                   "substack_mcp.py"
               ]
           }
       }
   }

3. Restart Claude for Desktop.

Example Queries

Once configured, you can ask Claude questions like:

• "Show me recent posts from https://stratechery.com/"
• "What's the content of this post: https://stratechery.com/2023/the-ai-unbundling/"
• "Search for 'AI' on https://stratechery.com/"
• "Who are the authors of https://stratechery.com/?"

Available Tools

The server provides the following MCP tools:

Tool	Description
get_newsletter_posts	Retrieves recent posts from a Substack newsletter
get_post_content	Gets the full content of a specific Substack post
search_newsletter	Searches for posts within a newsletter
get_author_info	Gets information about a Substack author
get_newsletter_recommendations	Gets recommended newsletters for a Substack publication
get_newsletter_authors	Gets authors of a Substack newsletter

Project Structure

• substack_mcp.py - The main MCP server implementation
• examples/ - Example queries and responses
• docker/ - Docker configuration for containerized deployment

Development

To contribute to this project:

1. Fork the repository
2. Create a feature branch (git checkout -b feature/amazing-feature)
3. Commit your changes (git commit -m 'Add some amazing feature')
4. Push to the branch (git push origin feature/amazing-feature)
5. Open a Pull Request

Troubleshooting

If you encounter issues:

1. Check Claude's logs for errors:

   # macOS/Linux
   tail -n 20 -f ~/Library/Logs/Claude/mcp*.log
   
   # Windows
   type %APPDATA%\Claude\Logs\mcp*.log

2. Verify your server builds and runs without errors:

   python substack_mcp.py

3. Make sure your claude_desktop_config.json file has the correct paths and syntax.

4. Try restarting Claude for Desktop completely.

License

This project is licensed under the MIT License - see the LICENSE file for details.

Acknowledgments

• Substack API - The underlying library for Substack interactions
• Model Context Protocol - Anthropic's protocol for standardized LLM integrations