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How to add Wikipedia MCP to Claude Desktop

Give your LLM live Wikipedia access: search, full articles, summaries, sections, links and key facts in any language. Paste the config into ~/Library/Application Support/Claude/claude_desktop_config.json and restart Claude Desktop.

Last updated June 14, 2026 · 270★ · stdio · no auth

Claude Desktop config for Wikipedia MCP

pipx install wikipedia-mcp
{
  "mcpServers": {
    "wikipedia-mcp": {
      "command": "wikipedia-mcp",
      "args": []
    }
  }
}

Setup steps

  1. 1Open Claude Desktop → Settings → Developer → Edit Config (this opens ~/Library/Application Support/Claude/claude_desktop_config.json).
  2. 2Paste the Wikipedia MCP config below under the top-level "mcpServers" key.
  3. 3Fill in any placeholder secrets (API keys, paths) in the snippet.
  4. 4Save the file, then fully quit and reopen Claude Desktop.
  5. 5Open a chat and confirm Wikipedia MCP's tools appear under the 🔌 tools menu.

Before you start

  • Python 3 with pipx (recommended) or pip
  • No API key required; optional free Wikipedia access token to avoid rate limits
  • An MCP client such as Claude Desktop

What Wikipedia MCP can do in Claude Desktop

search_wikipedia

Search Wikipedia for articles matching a query, with result metadata and status.

get_article

Get full article content: text, summary, sections, links and categories.

get_summary

Get a concise summary of an article.

get_sections

Get a structured list of an article's sections with content.

get_links

Get the links contained within an article.

get_coordinates

Get latitude/longitude coordinate data for an article.

get_related_topics

Get related topics based on an article's links and categories.

summarize_article_for_query

Summarize an article focused on a specific query.

Security

Read-only against Wikipedia's public API — no account, no key, no private data, and it writes nothing to your system beyond optional caching. If you expose the http/streamable-http transport beyond localhost, enable --auth-mode static or jwt so the endpoint is not open to everyone.

Wikipedia MCP + Claude Desktop FAQ

Where is the Claude Desktop config file?

Claude Desktop reads MCP servers from ~/Library/Application Support/Claude/claude_desktop_config.json. Paste the Wikipedia MCP config there under the "mcpServers" key and restart the client.

Is Wikipedia MCP safe to use with Claude Desktop?

Read-only against Wikipedia's public API — no account, no key, no private data, and it writes nothing to your system beyond optional caching. If you expose the http/streamable-http transport beyond localhost, enable --auth-mode static or jwt so the endpoint is not open to everyone.

Is the Wikipedia MCP free to use?

Yes. It is MIT-licensed, needs no API key, and talks to Wikipedia's free public API. Heavy usage can hit rate limits (403 errors); a free Wikipedia personal access token passed via --access-token removes that throttle.

Claude Desktop says spawn wikipedia-mcp ENOENT — what is wrong?

The command is not on Claude Desktop's PATH. Either install with pipx (which puts it in a global location) or set the config command to the absolute path printed by which wikipedia-mcp.

Can I use it with non-English Wikipedia?

Yes — pass --language (ja, zh-hans, zh-tw, sr-latn, ...) or the friendlier --country flag (Taiwan, Japan, Germany, ...). It maps 140+ countries and regions to the right language edition, including Chinese simplified/traditional variants, and you can run several language-specific server entries at once.

View repo Full Wikipedia MCP page