Developer quickstart

Start with MCP in minutes: create key, finish terminal bootstrap, then connect your client.

API quickstart

Create an API key, add MCP config in your client, and run your first search request in minutes.

bash

API_BASE=https://api.context8.org
API_KEY=<your-api-key>

curl -fsS -X POST "$API_BASE/search"   -H "Content-Type: application/json"   -H "X-API-Key: $API_KEY"   -d '{"query":"agent knowledge onboarding workflow","limit":5,"offset":0}'

Create and export an API key

Before you start, create an API key in Context8 Cloud and export it as an environment variable. Default cloud endpoint is https://api.context8.org. Without API key you can only search public solutions, and write operations are disabled.

Step 1

Create your API key from Context8 Cloud.

Open context8.org

Step 2

Add Context8 MCP config to your coding assistant.

Step 3

Run terminal onboarding and install MCP into clients in one flow.

Terminal bootstrap (v1.0.5+)

For the fastest setup, run the terminal-first flow to finish signup/login, create API key, and install MCP entries into client CLIs.

bash

# Fastest terminal onboarding (context8 v1.0.5+)
npm install -g context8

# 1) Signup/login in terminal and create+save API key
context8 auth-register <your-email> --api-key-name default

# 2) Verify installation + connectivity
context8 diagnose

# 3) Install MCP server into clients automatically
context8 setup-clients --clients codex,claude --scope local

Install MCP client and run diagnose

Pick your MCP client, paste the config, and run diagnose. Replace YOUR_API_KEY with your real key. If you do not have a key yet, use public read-only mode below.

jsonFile: ~/.cursor/mcp.json

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "context8": {
      "command": "npx",
      "args": ["-y", "context8-mcp"],
      "env": {
        "CONTEXT8_REMOTE_API_KEY": "YOUR_API_KEY"
      }
    }
  }
}

bash

# If you already have API key
# IMPORTANT: use --remote-url (not --url), and include protocol https://
context8 remote-config --remote-url https://api.context8.org --api-key <your-api-key>

# Verify installation + connectivity
context8 diagnose

# Install into supported clients
context8 setup-clients --clients codex,claude --scope local

# Preview commands only (no execution)
context8 setup-clients --clients codex,claude,goose,amp --dry-run

bash

# No API key mode: public search only (read-only)
# IMPORTANT: use --remote-url (not --url), and include protocol https://
context8-mcp remote-config --remote-url https://api.context8.org

# Search public solutions
context8-mcp search-solutions "redis timeout" --limit 5 --mode hybrid

# You cannot create/update/delete solutions without API key

# If you see "Failed to parse URL from api.context8.org/..."
# then remote URL is invalid (missing protocol). Fix config and re-run diagnose.
context8-mcp diagnose

# Optional network checks
nslookup api.context8.org
curl https://api.context8.org/status