Crossref MCP Server

by smaboundless Your server? Claim it

local only

Crossref runs on your own machine — the client starts it, so there is no endpoint to ping. 69 installs a week from pypi. Last commit 4 Jul 2026.

Search and retrieve scholarly metadata from the Crossref REST API

Installs per day peak 25 · avg 14 · -28% w/w

a month agotoday

Installs / week

pypi · crossref-mcp-server

Stars

0 open issues

4 Jul 2026

Last commit

0 releases in 90 days

MIT

License

Python

Nothing serious here today

Today is the operative word: we check Crossref every 15 minutes and re-read its code on every release. Watch it and you find out the day that stops being true.

Connect this server

This server runs on your own machine — install it with the package manager and the client starts it for you. Package name taken from the official registry entry.

Claude Code Claude Desktop Codex Cursor VS Code

run in your terminal

claude mcp add crossref -- uvx crossref-mcp-server

~/Library/Application Support/Claude/claude_desktop_config.json

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "crossref": {
      "args": [
        "crossref-mcp-server"
      ],
      "command": "uvx"
    }
  }
}

~/.codex/config.toml

[mcp_servers.crossref]
command = "uvx"
args = ["crossref-mcp-server"]

.cursor/mcp.json

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "crossref": {
      "args": [
        "crossref-mcp-server"
      ],
      "command": "uvx"
    }
  }
}

.vscode/mcp.json

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "crossref": {
      "args": [
        "crossref-mcp-server"
      ],
      "command": "uvx"
    }
  }
}

This one needs environment variables set before it will start: CROSSREF_MAILTO (Your email for Crossref polite pool (better rate limits, no key needed)). The author declared them in the registry entry; get the values from the project itself.

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Crossref — questions

Answers built from our own checks of this server.

Why is there no uptime for Crossref?

Crossref runs on your own machine over stdio — there is no network address to reach, so uptime cannot be measured for it by anyone. What can be measured is adoption: the pypi package crossref-mcp-server was installed 69 times last week.

How do I connect Crossref?

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 runs locally, so the command pulls crossref-mcp-server straight from pypi; nothing to host, nothing to sign up for.

How many people use Crossref?

The pypi package crossref-mcp-server was installed 69 times in the last week. Week over week that is -28%. We show installs rather than GitHub stars on purpose: a star is a bookmark, an install is someone actually running it.

Is Crossref open source?

Yes — it is published under the MIT licence, written in Python and 0 stars on GitHub. The source link is on this page, so you can read exactly what it does with your data before you connect it.