mcpbeat

Zipexplore MCP Server

io.github.andrew-sondgeroth/zipexplore-mcp
answering

Zipexplore MCP is answering right now. Last checked 9 min ago. It exposes 22 tools.

US ZIP code intelligence: demographics, weather, tax, crime, housing, voting, and more.

Uptime history 41 hours of history
41 hours agonow
100.0%
Uptime 24h
91 of 91 checks
22
Tools
read from the server
520 ms
Response time
average over 24h
open, no key
Access
streamable-http

Connect this server

Endpoint below is the one we actually reach during checks — not the one copied from a README. Last verified 9 min ago.

run in your terminal
claude mcp add zipexplore-mcp --transport http https://mcp.zipexplore.com/mcp
~/Library/Application Support/Claude/claude_desktop_config.json
{
  "mcpServers": {
    "zipexplore-mcp": {
      "url": "https://mcp.zipexplore.com/mcp"
    }
  }
}
~/.codex/config.toml
[mcp_servers.zipexplore-mcp]
url = "https://mcp.zipexplore.com/mcp"
.cursor/mcp.json
{
  "mcpServers": {
    "zipexplore-mcp": {
      "url": "https://mcp.zipexplore.com/mcp"
    }
  }
}
.vscode/mcp.json
{
  "mcpServers": {
    "zipexplore-mcp": {
      "url": "https://mcp.zipexplore.com/mcp"
    }
  }
}

Available tools 22

Read directly from the server with tools/list, grouped by what they act on. If a tool disappears, we record the date.

zip
get_zip_centroids
Get the latitude/longitude centroid for one or more ZIP codes (max 200). Use when you need map coordinates for a set of ZIPs.
get_zip_profile
Full location profile for one ZIP code across all 12 data domains: demographics, climate, tax, crime, cost of living, voting, education, healthcare, business, air quality, disaster risk, and transit. Use this to get detail on a ZIP after search, or when the user asks about a specific ZIP. For deeper data on one domain, use the domain-specific tools.
air
get_air_quality_profile
Detailed air quality data for one ZIP code. Use when get_zip_profile's air quality section isn't sufficient depth. Includes EPA AQS pollutant levels (PM2.5, PM10, ozone, NO2, SO2, CO) and AQI summary.
article
get_article
Returns the full prose of a specific ZipExplore research article. Use this for editing, fact-checking, detailed analysis, or when get_research summaries aren't enough. Valid slugs: disappearing-towns, hazard-premium, snap-economy, wealthy-retirees. Each article includes all body sections and methodology notes exactly as published.
business
get_business_profile
Detailed business and employment data for one ZIP code. Use when get_zip_profile's business section isn't sufficient depth. Includes top industries, sector breakdowns, total establishments, employment, and annual payroll from Census BDS/CBP data.
census
get_census_profile
Detailed Census / demographics data for one ZIP code. Use when get_zip_profile's demographics section isn't sufficient depth. Includes population, housing, income distribution, education attainment, economic indicators, internet access, and public assistance rates.
compare
compare_zips
Side-by-side full profiles for 2–5 ZIP codes. Use when the user has finalists and needs to choose between them. Returns the same profile shape as get_zip_profile for each ZIP.
cost
get_cost_profile
Detailed cost of living data for one ZIP code. Use when get_zip_profile's cost section isn't sufficient depth. Includes fair market rents, housing cost burden, regional price indices, and affordability metrics.
crime
get_crime_profile
Detailed crime data for one ZIP code. Use when get_zip_profile's crime section isn't sufficient depth. Includes violent crime rate, property crime rate, and data quality flags (coverage level, Bayesian shrinkage).
disaster
get_disaster_risk_profile
Detailed natural disaster risk data for one ZIP code. Use when get_zip_profile's disaster risk section isn't sufficient depth. Includes FEMA NRI overall risk score, individual hazard scores (hurricane, tornado, earthquake, wildfire, flood, etc.), and expected annual loss estimates.
education
get_education_profile
Detailed school data for one ZIP code. Use when get_zip_profile's education section isn't sufficient depth. Includes school counts, student-teacher ratios, graduation rates, per-pupil spending, Title I percentage, and budget breakdown (instruction vs. admin vs. capital). May reflect data from the nearest ZIP if no schools are in this ZIP.
fields
get_search_fields
Lists every field name, type, and description available for search criteria. Call this when you're unsure what field names to pass to search_zips, or when the user asks what data ZipExplore has.
healthcare
get_healthcare_profile
Detailed healthcare data for one ZIP code. Use when get_zip_profile's healthcare section isn't sufficient depth. Includes hospital count and ratings, nursing homes, beds per capita, primary care and mental health shortage area designations, pharmacy count, and urgent care count.
methodology
get_methodology
Returns ZipExplore's data interpretation guide: reasoning guardrails (associations vs. causes, small-ZIP noise, averages hiding distributions, editorial score weights, drawing conclusions about people from geographic data), quality flag definitions, known data limitations, coverage gap explanations, and per-domain vintage summary. Call this when you have questions about data quality, what a quality_flag code means, why a ZIP has no data, or how to reason carefully about scores and correlations.
ping
ping
Returns server status and tool/resource counts. Use this to verify the ZipExplore MCP connection is live.
research
get_research
Returns ZipExplore's published research articles — original data findings on topics including disaster risk vs. housing costs (the Hazard Premium), food insecurity in fully-employed communities (SNAP economy), economically declining towns vs. retirement communities, and income variation among America's oldest ZIP codes. Each entry includes the key finding, specific quantitative results, caveats, and a URL to the full article. Call this when a user asks about these topics or when published findings would add context to a live data lookup.
reverse
reverse_geocode
Convert a latitude/longitude coordinate to a ZIP code. Use when the user provides an address or map coordinates rather than a ZIP code.
tax
get_tax_profile
Detailed tax data for one ZIP code. Use when get_zip_profile's tax section isn't sufficient depth. Includes state income tax, sales tax, property tax effective rates, excise taxes, and IRS income statistics.
transit
get_transit_profile
Detailed public transit data for one ZIP code. Use when get_zip_profile's transit section isn't sufficient depth. Includes bus stop count, subway station count, rail station count, light rail count, ferry terminal count, total transit stops, transit commute percentage, and nearest subway/rail distances.
voting
get_voting_profile
Detailed voting and political data for one ZIP code. Use when get_zip_profile's voting section isn't sufficient depth. Includes presidential election results, partisan lean, congressional and state legislative districts, and state officials.
weather
get_weather_profile
Detailed climate data for one ZIP code. Use when get_zip_profile's climate section isn't sufficient depth. Includes annual/monthly temperature averages, precipitation, humidity, and nearest weather station info.
zips
search_zips
Find ZIP codes matching one or more criteria. Returns a ranked list with scores. Use this first when the user wants recommendations (e.g. "find a low-crime suburb near Denver"). Call get_search_fields first if you're unsure what field names to use. criteria: list of {"field": str, "level": "low"|"medium"|"high"} area_types: "CITY" | "SUBURB" | "SMALL_TOWN" | "RURAL" regions: "northeast" | "southeast" | "midwest" | "southwest" | "west"

Endpoints

URLTransportStateLatencyChecked
https://mcp.zipexplore.com/mcp streamable-http answering 553 ms 9 min ago

Zipexplore MCP — questions

Answers built from our own checks of this server.

What can Zipexplore MCP do?
It exposes 22 tools, read directly from the server on our last check. Among them: compare_zips, get_air_quality_profile, get_article, get_business_profile, get_census_profile, get_cost_profile and 16 more. The full list with descriptions is on this page — we take it from the server itself via tools/list, not from a README. How MCP servers expose tools in the first place →
Is Zipexplore MCP working right now?
We send a real MCP handshake every 15 minutes. Over the last 24 hours 91 of 91 checks got a reply (100.0%), average response time 520 ms. The bar chart above shows every period we have measured.
How do I connect Zipexplore MCP?
Copy the ready config from this page — we generate it for Claude Code, Claude Desktop, Codex, Cursor and VS Code, each with the file path that client actually reads. It is a remote server, so there is nothing to install — the client connects to the address.
Does Zipexplore MCP need an API key?
No. Zipexplore MCP completed a full MCP handshake with us as an anonymous client and listed its tools without asking for anything. All 22 of them are readable on this page. This is what we observed, not what the docs claim.
How fast is Zipexplore MCP?
It answers our handshake in 520 ms on average, which is faster than 21% of all working MCP servers we measure. That is on the slow side — worth knowing if the tool sits inside an interactive loop. The comparison comes from our own checks across the whole registry, every 15 minutes.