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ModelSpec MCP Server

by turbobeest Your server? Claim it
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ModelSpec is answering right now. Last checked 10 min ago. It exposes 8 tools. Last commit 16 Oct 2026.

Find AI models that fit a job from your requirements, sourced benchmarks and real cost.

Uptime history 21 hours of history
21 hours agonow
100.0%
Uptime 24h
77 of 77 checks
8
Tools
read from the server
210 ms
Response time
average over 24h
2
Stars
last commit 16 Oct 2026

Nothing serious here today

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

Three servers free · no card

Connect this server

Endpoint below is the one we actually reach during checks — not the one copied from a README. Last verified 10 min ago.

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

Available tools 8

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

compare
compare_models
Which facts, offerings and evidence do 2 to 4 named models have? Returns snapshot facts, offerings, evidence and sources in caller order; unknown values stay null. Needs an API key (Authorization: Bearer). Costs 2 credits a call; a credit costs $0.0053–$0.02 depending on the plan or pack (https://modelspec.dev/pricing/). It doesn't choose a model and does not rank or choose a winner. Proxies POST https://api.modelspec.dev/v1/compare-models with {models: [...]} and returns at most 16 KB.
decide
decide
Which models fit this job? Returns answer, ranked results, may_qualify, reading and recovery hints, decision_id and snapshot. Never add a gate or constraint the user didn't state. Relax only constraints the user stated, one at a time, and say what was relaxed and why. Prefer the answer's own `relax` suggestions. A tie stays a tie. Don't promote a member by knowledge from outside the response. Cite only evidence in the response. Never add benchmark figures from memory. Tied or partial answer: report the tie and caveats, pick no member; a null answer names no pick and says what's missing. A null cost is unknown. Never show it as $0.00 or "free". One vocabulary lookup per unknown facet, then decide. Read `next` before another call. Size `task_tokens` from the user's own task, and say what you assumed. Don't copy the guide's example sizes. Template weights are examples, not requirements. If the evidence basis or board does not match the task, say so: Arena web-dev evidence does not establish chat quality. p_best is the probability of ranking best under the Spec and evidence uncertainty, not the probability of matching the user's task or satisfying its requirements. Read reading when present. Present answer.kind=tied among all answer.members, including with_estate; tie-breakers are conditional. State requirements in reading.not_applied or error.issues that were not applied, including requirements removed after a rejected call. A retry does not verify them. Report estimates as estimates: fits_hardware membership is not measured fit for a specific quantization and context workload. Follow reading.do_not_claim. Never claim a rank the response does not show. Present `summary_for_user` to the user unchanged and keep every `must_mention` item. When `next_move` is present, offer it instead of a pick. Needs an API key (Authorization: Bearer). Costs 1 or 2 credits a call; a credit costs $0.0053–$0.02 depending on the plan or pack (https://modelspec.dev/pricing/). Not a router: call it once per job or role, not per request, then route among the models it recommends. Proxies POST https://api.modelspec.dev/v1/decide. Call decide early with a template-based Spec; refine from reading and recovery hints. Put Musts in where: these gates exclude. Put Prefers in optimize.weights: weights rank and never exclude. Unknown values go to may_qualify. Pin snapshot for reproducibility. MCP decide returns a bounded answer of at most 16 KB, summary included. Drill down with evidence_for. Complete rows need fields:null; explanation.fetch names what was removed and how to fetch it. With explain unset or "none": explain=none, limit=10, fields model_rank, cost_per_task, estimates, p_best. summary or full also sends contributions and evidence. omitted counts removed records; explain=none does not compute eliminations. explicit fields, including null, is sent as given. Over 16 KB the body is a trimmed notice and explanation.fetch says how to resend. decision_id is a citation, not a stored lookup. task free text is rejected; where is an array. Call shape, examples, recovery and budgets: https://modelspec.dev/agents.md. Null means not researched or not published, never a guess. Every sourced value on a card carries a URL and a read date. This tool returns the origin's JSON plus the origin URL; it does not invent fields. Example. Answer: status partial, answer.kind tied (a/x, b/y), next_move.kind decide_by_testing. Right report: summary_for_user verbatim, each must_mention item, then next_move.steps for its candidates. Wrong: "Start with a/x", a shortlist, or a ranked table.
feedback
feedback
Was a ModelSpec answer reliable? After you act on an answer, say whether it was reliable, unreliable, trustworthy, untrustworthy or confusing, by proxying POST https://api.modelspec.dev/v1/feedback. Include the answer's decision_id. Free, no key, and no Authorization header is forwarded. Not for questions or support. Never put a prompt, a key or personal details in note. The response says status "recorded" or "not_recorded" (storage is off until the privacy statement covers it).
model
model_info
What does ModelSpec's card say about one model? Reads https://modelspec.dev/api/models/<model_id>.json (model_id is provider/slug). With data splitting, returns only the model's display name from the Worker vocabulary. Needs an API key. Not current evidence and not a ranking: use decide for that.
policy
policy_check
Which models, on which platforms, does my policy allow? Checks a policy document (licence, origin, data handling) per model and per platform. Returns pass, fail or undetermined for each row; undetermined is not a pass. Needs an API key (Authorization: Bearer). Costs 5 credits a call; a credit costs $0.0053–$0.02 depending on the plan or pack (https://modelspec.dev/pricing/). It doesn't choose a model: use decide to choose among the ones that pass. Proxies POST https://api.modelspec.dev/v1/policy-check with this tool's arguments as the JSON body; Authorization is forwarded.
rank
rank
Legacy v1; use decide. Deprecated: the retired fixed-benchmark ranking, whose scores lag the catalogue; newer models are often unranked. Which models rank highest for one fixed use-case profile? Returns a shortlist with evidence_basis, input provenance, not a quality verdict. Needs an API key (Authorization: Bearer). Costs 1 credit a call; a credit costs $0.0053–$0.02 depending on the plan or pack (https://modelspec.dev/pricing/). Don't call it as a fallback when decide names no single leader: report decide's tie. Present `summary_for_user` to the user unchanged and keep every `must_mention` item. When `next_move` is present, offer it instead of a pick. Proxies POST https://api.modelspec.dev/v1/rank with this tool's arguments as the JSON body.
use
list_use_cases
Which ranking profiles exist, and what is the ranking policy? Returns https://modelspec.dev/api/rank/profiles.json: the profiles, the evidence floors and the neutrality commitment. Needs an API key. Not a decision: use decide for that.
vocab
vocab
What can a decide spec say? Returns the decision vocabulary: valid facet ids, benchmarks, domains, providers and task types. Compact by default, with 20 rows per page and no counts. Split-mode full details exclude per-model facts and counts. Needs an API key. Use it for missing ids, not to compare models. One vocabulary lookup per unknown facet, then decide. Read `next` before another call. section=starter returns a ready-to-send minimal Spec and a next hint. Search covers every section's ids, labels, definitions, values and synonyms. All tokens rank first; a content-token subset can match. A miss returns the nearest ids. An explicit non-starter section scopes the search. Use id or ids for row details, or detail=full for all display details. Use offset and limit to page matches across sections, including full details; an empty page ends the list.

Endpoints

URLTransportStateLatencyChecked
https://api.modelspec.dev/mcp streamable-http answering 184 ms 10 min ago

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ModelSpec — questions

Answers built from our own checks of this server.

What can ModelSpec do?
It exposes 8 tools, read directly from the server on our last check. Among them: compare_models, decide, feedback, list_use_cases, model_info, policy_check and 2 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 ModelSpec working right now?
We send a real MCP handshake every 15 minutes. Over the last 24 hours 77 of 77 checks got a reply (100.0%), average response time 210 ms. The bar chart above shows every period we have measured.
How do I connect ModelSpec?
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 ModelSpec need an API key?
No. ModelSpec completed a full MCP handshake with us as an anonymous client and listed its tools without asking for anything. All 8 of them are readable on this page. This is what we observed, not what the docs claim.
How fast is ModelSpec?
It answers our handshake in 210 ms on average, which is faster than 59% of all working MCP servers we measure. The comparison comes from our own checks across the whole registry, every 15 minutes.
Is ModelSpec open source?
Yes — it is published under the MIT licence, written in Python, 2 stars on GitHub and 159 open issues. The source link is on this page, so you can read exactly what it does with your data before you connect it.