In-depth architectural comparison of the Find Research Papers and Paperboy MCP servers. Compare execution transports, security boundaries, tool capabilities, quality scores, and ready-to-paste client installation snippets for Claude, Cursor, Windsurf, and VS Code.
At a Glance & Executive Verdict
Find Research Papers
Research · Local stdio
Quality: 40/100 (Fair) | Auth: No auth required
Paperboy
Research · Local stdio
Quality: 52/100 (Good) | Auth: other
Verdict Summary: Choose Find Research Papers if you need specialized Research tools running via a local process. Choose Paperboy if your workspace requires Research integration with local subprocess execution. Both servers can be configured concurrently in your client's mcpServers manifest.
Which MCP Server Should You Choose?
Choose Find Research Papers when:
You need dedicated capabilities in the Research domain.
You prefer local stdio subprocess transport architecture.
Your security boundary fits: No auth required (Free / Open Source).
Primary tools included: Unified search across five scholarly indexes, Paper metadata, abstract, and PDF-link retrieval, Reference and citation graph lookup.
Search open-source research papers across arXiv, OpenAlex, Crossref, PubMed, Semantic Scholar.
Send research papers from Claude to a Kindle or Kobo, with Zotero as the source of truth. Searches arXiv and OpenAlex, recommends related work via the Semantic Scholar citation graph, queues papers in a Zotero collection, and delivers the PDFs by email or Dropbox. Receipts report file sizes and name anything that could not be sent.
Category & Scope
Tools & Capabilities Breakdown
Find Research Papers Tools (6)
Unified search across five scholarly indexes
Paper metadata, abstract, and PDF-link retrieval
Reference and citation graph lookup
Paper accessibility and retraction checks
Live source status and latency reporting
Dynamic research-skill loading
Paperboy Tools (14)
search_papers
Ready-to-Paste Client Configurations
Paste either (or both) of these JSON server blocks into your client config file (e.g. claude_desktop_config.json or ~/.cursor/mcp.json).
Find Research Papers is categorized under Research and uses a local stdio subprocess. In contrast, Paperboy belongs to Research using local stdio subprocess. Select Find Research Papers when you need capabilities focused on research and Paperboy when you require tools for research.
Search OpenAlex (general) or arXiv (`source="arxiv"`); results carry a `ref` and an `open_access_pdf` flag
recommend_papers
Discover related or new papers: citation-graph recommendations (Semantic Scholar) seeded from your Zotero library, plus keyword discovery from interests Claude distills out of the conversation. Excludes papers you already have
send_papers
One-off send by arXiv id, DOI, URL, or title (also records in Zotero if configured)
queue_papers
Add papers to the Zotero Reading Queue without sending (optionally filed into topical collections)
add_to_library
Track papers in Zotero **without** queueing or sending them (owned, paywalled, or read-later); a missing OA PDF is not treated as a failure
add_book
Catalogue a book by ISBN, book DOI, or title as a Zotero `book` item (Crossref, Open Library, Google Books); never delivered
attach_pdf
Ingest a PDF you already have (grey literature, open-access textbooks) with the PDF attached and metadata you supply; optionally send it
list_collections
List Zotero collections so Claude can propose where to file a paper, or ask you
file_papers
File queued papers into a topical collection (created on demand; queue membership unaffected)
unfile_papers
Remove papers from one collection (for misfiled items); the papers themselves and their queue/sent state are untouched
list_queue
Show the queue with per-item status (unsent / sent / no-open-access-pdf)