The tool
cortexa_research
Your host agent sees one tool. Cortexa decomposes the research question, searches across 1.4K+ live and curated tools, uses private connections explicitly granted to the key owner, and returns a cited markdown answer.
Durable cross-surface sessions
Omit
sessionId to create a durable Cortexa session and receive its web continuation link. Supply an authorized sessionId to continue the same transcript from MCP, Slack, or the Cortexa web app.Private connections are opt-in
Mint the key with
connections:use. The key still cannot exceed the user's or organization's live connection grants, and revocation applies on the next tool call.Credit charging & HTTP 402
MCP research uses the same monthly credits, paid overage, and user-controlled cap as the web app and developer API.
Charges follow model usage
Each model-producing
cortexa_research call debits the account that owns the API key according to its actual token usage and agent work. MCP request counts are retained for diagnostics but are not a separate billing unit.When the host receives HTTP 402
The account has exhausted included credits without overage, reached its monthly cap, has an unverified email, or Cortexa could not safely verify the budget. Resolve the billing or verification state in Cortexa, then retry the tool call. Some MCP hosts display this as a tool error rather than showing the raw status code.
Add Cortexa to your host
Nothing to install. Every host below talks to the hosted endpoint over streamable HTTP, authenticated with your API key.
Cursor
Use ~/.cursor/mcp.json for user-wide setup or .cursor/mcp.json inside a workspace.
{
"mcpServers": {
"cortexa": {
"url": "https://api.cortexa.sh/mcp",
"headers": {
"Authorization": "Bearer sk-cortexa-live-..."
}
}
}
}Claude Code & Claude Desktop
Run this once; Claude stores the server and its header. In Claude Desktop you can instead add it under Settings → Connectors.
claude mcp add --transport http cortexa \
https://api.cortexa.sh/mcp \
--header "Authorization: Bearer sk-cortexa-live-..."Codex
Add this TOML block to ~/.codex/config.toml, then export CORTEXA_API_KEY in the shell that launches Codex. Codex reads the variable name, not the token.
[mcp_servers.cortexa]
url = "https://api.cortexa.sh/mcp"
bearer_token_env_var = "CORTEXA_API_KEY"Any other MCP client
The generic form, for hosts not listed above. Point the client at
https://api.cortexa.sh/mcpand pass the same bearer token you use for the API.{
"mcpServers": {
"cortexa": {
"type": "http",
"url": "https://api.cortexa.sh/mcp",
"headers": {
"Authorization": "Bearer sk-cortexa-live-..."
}
}
}
}Smoke test
After you add the config, verify the key, reload the host, and ask one narrow source-backed question.
Confirm the key
Create a named key so you know which client owns the traffic.
Restart the host
Desktop clients usually need a restart or MCP reload after config changes.
Ask a narrow question
“Use Cortexa to find three cited sources about tau-PET endpoints.”