Tools

Seven tools covering the full PokéAPI v2 surface — a flagship consolidation tool, a computed matchup tool, single-resource lookups, and a filter tool:

pokeapi_get_pokemon

The flagship tool — fans out across the PokéAPI resource graph in parallel and returns one denormalized dossier, replacing 10–30 sub-resource GETs.

• Fetches /pokemon, /pokemon-species, /evolution-chain, and each /ability in a two-tier parallel fan-out
• Includes sprites (with official-artwork high-quality art URL), is_legendary, is_mythical, capture_rate, growth_rate, gender_rate
• include_moves (default false) — set to true for a summarized learnable-move list filtered to the latest generation
• game_version string to select flavor text by game (e.g. "sword", "red") — silently falls back to first available when no match
• Surfaces the variant list so callers can re-call with a specific form name (regional forms, Gigantamax, Mega, etc.)

pokeapi_get_type_matchups

Computed type effectiveness — pass a type name or Pokémon identifier to get the full offensive and defensive breakdown with multiplier values.

• For dual-type Pokémon: composes both type defensive relations correctly (immune in either type wins)
• Returns superEffective, resistant, and immune lists for both offense and defense
• Accepts either type (type name) or pokemon (name or dex number) — exactly one required

pokeapi_find_pokemon

Filter Pokémon by multiple criteria — returns names and dex numbers for follow-up pokeapi_get_pokemon calls.

• Filters: generation (e.g. "generation-i"), type (e.g. "fire"), pokedex (e.g. "kanto"), egg_group (e.g. "fairy")
• query parameter for fuzzy name search
• Pagination via limit and offset

Resources and prompts

All resource data is also reachable via tools.

Features

Built on @cyanheads/mcp-ts-core:

• Declarative tool and resource definitions — single file per primitive, framework handles registration and validation
• Unified error handling — handlers throw, framework catches, classifies, and formats
• Pluggable auth: none, jwt, oauth
• Swappable storage backends: in-memory, filesystem, Supabase, Cloudflare KV/R2/D1
• Structured logging with optional OpenTelemetry tracing
• STDIO and Streamable HTTP transports

PokéAPI-specific:

• Keyless and read-only — no API key, no auth, no configuration required to run
• Graph-walk consolidation — pokeapi_get_pokemon fans out across /pokemon, /pokemon-species, /evolution-chain, and N /ability endpoints in two parallel tiers, returning one object
• Aggressive caching — PokéAPI data is static game data; responses are cached in ctx.state with a configurable TTL (default 6 h) to respect PokéAPI's fair-use policy
• Input normalization — accepts lowercase-hyphenated names or numeric IDs; strips and lowercases user input before fetching
• English-first — effect_entries and flavor_text_entries are always filtered to language.name === 'en'; absent entries surface as null rather than a foreign-language string

Agent-friendly output:

• Dual-type composition — pokeapi_get_type_matchups computes the effective matchup matrix from raw damage relations, so agents get a direct answer rather than raw tables to multiply
• Variant surface — pokeapi_get_pokemon lists all form variants so agents can identify and re-call with specific forms (Alolan, Galarian, Mega, Gigantamax)
• Sparse-safe nullable fields — upstream absent fields surface as null rather than crashing or returning a fabricated default

Getting started

Public Hosted Instance

A public instance is available at https://pokeapi.caseyjhand.com/mcp — no installation required. Point any MCP client at it via Streamable HTTP:

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "pokeapi-mcp-server": {
      "type": "streamable-http",
      "url": "https://pokeapi.caseyjhand.com/mcp"
    }
  }
}

Self-Hosted / Local

No API key required. Add the following to your MCP client configuration file:

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "pokeapi-mcp-server": {
      "type": "stdio",
      "command": "bunx",
      "args": ["@cyanheads/pokeapi-mcp-server@latest"],
      "env": {
        "MCP_TRANSPORT_TYPE": "stdio",
        "MCP_LOG_LEVEL": "info"
      }
    }
  }
}

Or with npx (no Bun required):

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "pokeapi-mcp-server": {
      "type": "stdio",
      "command": "npx",
      "args": ["-y", "@cyanheads/pokeapi-mcp-server@latest"],
      "env": {
        "MCP_TRANSPORT_TYPE": "stdio",
        "MCP_LOG_LEVEL": "info"
      }
    }
  }
}

Or with Docker:

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "pokeapi-mcp-server": {
      "type": "stdio",
      "command": "docker",
      "args": [
        "run", "-i", "--rm",
        "-e", "MCP_TRANSPORT_TYPE=stdio",
        "ghcr.io/cyanheads/pokeapi-mcp-server:latest"
      ]
    }
  }
}

For Streamable HTTP, set the transport and start the server:

MCP_TRANSPORT_TYPE=http MCP_HTTP_PORT=3010 bun run start:http
# Server listens at http://localhost:3010/mcp

Prerequisites

• Bun v1.3.0 or higher (or Node.js v24+).
• No API key required — PokéAPI is fully public.

Installation

1. Clone the repository:

git clone https://github.com/cyanheads/pokeapi-mcp-server.git

2. Navigate into the directory:

cd pokeapi-mcp-server

3. Install dependencies:

bun install

4. Configure environment (optional):

cp .env.example .env
# All vars are optional — the server works with defaults

Configuration

See .env.example for the full list of optional overrides.

Self-hosting for high-volume use

PokéAPI's Fair Use Policy asks consumers to cache aggressively and points high-volume deployments toward running a local instance. This server already caches responses for 6 hours by default (POKEAPI_CACHE_TTL_SECONDS), which covers most workloads. For hosted or batch-heavy deployments, run the official PokéAPI Docker image locally and point POKEAPI_BASE_URL at it — the server switches transparently.

Running the server

Local development

• Build and run:

  sh

  Copy

  bun run rebuild
  
  bun run start:stdio
  # or
  bun run start:http
  

• Run checks and tests:

  sh

  Copy

  bun run devcheck   # Lint, format, typecheck, security
  bun run test       # Vitest test suite
  bun run lint:mcp   # Validate MCP definitions against spec
  

Docker

docker build -t pokeapi-mcp-server .
docker run --rm -p 3010:3010 pokeapi-mcp-server

The Dockerfile defaults to HTTP transport, stateless session mode, and logs to /var/log/pokeapi-mcp-server. Build with --build-arg OTEL_ENABLED=false to omit OpenTelemetry peer dependencies.

Project structure

Development guide

See CLAUDE.md for development guidelines and architectural rules. The short version:

• Handlers throw, framework catches — catch typed upstream errors only to map a declared errors[] contract with ctx.fail(...)
• Use ctx.log for request-scoped logging, ctx.state for tenant-scoped storage (and caching)
• Register new tools and resources via the barrels in src/mcp-server/*/definitions/index.ts
• Wrap external API calls: validate raw → normalize to domain type → return output schema; never fabricate missing fields

Contributing

Issues and pull requests are welcome. Run checks and tests before submitting:

bun run devcheck
bun run test

License

Apache-2.0 — see LICENSE for details.