Plain Freight MCP server

A hosted Model Context Protocol server that quotes real freight. Ask it what it costs to ship something from China to the United States and it returns an all-in delivered-duty-paid price from the same pricing engine a human customer is quoted from: freight, US customs clearance, import duty and delivery to a US door, in one number.

No API key. No signup. Nothing to install.

Code

https://plainfreight.com/api/mcp

Transport is Streamable HTTP, stateless, protocol version 2025-06-18 (also accepts 2025-03-26 and 2024-11-05).

Add it to a client

Claude Code:

Terminal

claude mcp add --transport http plain-freight https://plainfreight.com/api/mcp

Claude Desktop, Cursor, or anything reading a JSON config:

config.json

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "plain-freight": {
      "type": "http",
      "url": "https://plainfreight.com/api/mcp"
    }
  }
}

Check it by hand:

Terminal

curl -s -X POST https://plainfreight.com/api/mcp \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -H "Accept: application/json, text/event-stream" \
  -d '{"jsonrpc":"2.0","id":1,"method":"tools/list"}'

Tools

Five tools. Only generate_offer records anything; the other four only read. No tool books or charges anything.

Tool	What it does
`estimate_price`	A rough door to door cost in USD for air (and sea from 100 kg chargeable weight), from the same pricing engine. Needs `weight_kg`; `product`, carton sizes (`carton_length_cm`, `carton_width_cm`, `carton_height_cm`, `carton_count`) or `total_cbm` sharpen it. Returns the chargeable weight used (the greater of actual weight and carton volume in cm3 / 6,000), transit estimates and whether US import duty is included. Records nothing, contacts no one, needs no email. Goods that need a person to review them get no figure.
`check_goods`	Says whether a product (`product`, in the user's words) is priced at once or reviewed by a person first (for example batteries, chemicals, food, cosmetics, seeds, vapes or weapons), with a plain explanation and what documents to have ready. Same screen as `generate_offer`, so it predicts what an offer will do. Records nothing. Not legal or customs advice.
`generate_offer`	The firm offer. Needs `product` and `weight_kg` (0.1 to 2000); `dimensions`, `origin`, `destination_zip`, `urgency`, `email`, `name` and `notes` all improve the answer. Pass carton sizes when you have them: for light bulky cargo the volumetric weight sets the price, not the scale weight. Each call records a quote request, and if an `email` is given the written offer is mailed there once the second check settles (at most one offer email per address per day). Returns the options, a `quote_id` and a link to a booking form on plainfreight.com prefilled with the shipment.
`check_offer_status`	Polls an offer by `quote_id` until `settled` is true. Every quote gets a second check, which can add follow-up questions, change the options, or set `needs_review`. Read-only.
`track_shipment`	Reads the live record for a booked shipment from its `tracking_link` (`https://plainfreight.com/track/<token>`, or the bare token): current stage on the 10-stage lifecycle, route and dated events. Read-only.

Booking happens outside the chat: the user opens the prefilled booking form, replies to the offer email, or writes to hello@plainfreight.com quoting the quote_id. Nothing is paid before the goods are weighed at the warehouse.

Two behaviours worth knowing before you build on it:

needs_review means the prices are withheld on purpose. The goods look restricted (batteries, food, chemicals) and a person has to clear them first. Do not present a number to the user in that case; Plain Freight follows up by email.
The tracking token is the credential. Anyone holding the link can read that shipment, and the record deliberately excludes cost and margin fields.

Rate limits: 20 offers per hour per IP, 4 per email address, 30 across all agents per hour. For bulk or programmatic access, email hello@plainfreight.com.

There is also a plain REST version of the same pricing call at POST https://plainfreight.com/api/v1/offer, described in openapi.json, and human documentation at plainfreight.com/for-agents.

Published reference data

The same engine feeds three pages that are free to cite, with CSV and JSON where it makes sense:

China to USA shipping price index: dated door-to-door prices at twelve weights from 0.5 kg to 1,000 kg, with duty status and transit time on every row.
Chargeable weight reference: what fifteen real cartons bill, and the same cartons at three divisors.
US import rules timeline: every de minimis and entry change since May 2025 with its Federal Register citation.

The price-index data is also published as a dataset at plainfreight-com/china-usa-freight-price-index.

What Plain Freight is

A China to USA freight agency for small importers: one all-in DDP price on shipments from 100 g to 2,000 kg, quoted before pickup. Plain Freight is a trading name of Fisto LLC, a Wyoming limited liability company. The price does not include cargo insurance, which the customer arranges separately.

Questions, or a shipment that needs a human: hello@plainfreight.com

Licence

MIT for the contents of this repository. The MCP server itself is a live commercial service; using it means quoting real freight, so treat the prices as real.