Summary
Fetches web content and converts it to clean markdown using Defuddle instead of the standard Readability library. Exposes a single fetch tool that takes a URL and optional parameters for pagination (start_index, max_length) and output format (raw HTML or markdown). Returns the main content stripped of navigation and clutter, plus metadata like title, author, publication date, and word count. Built as a drop-in replacement for the default MCP fetch server, with better extraction on modern sites especially GitHub. Install via npx and point Claude at it when you need cleaner web scraping than Readability provides.
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one prompt install →defuddle-fetch-mcp-server
A Model Context Protocol server that provides web content fetching capabilities using the Defuddle library. This server enables LLMs to retrieve and process content from web pages, automatically cleaning up the HTML and converting it to clean, readable markdown.
This is a drop-in replacement for the default fetch MCP server that uses Readability. This generally provides better results for most modern webpages.
Comparison
(using this issue)
| Default Fetch MCP | Defuddle Fetch MCP |
|---|---|
| Contents of https://github.com/kepano/defuddle/issues/61: The MCP protocol is a standard for giving AI models access to tools. There's a default fetch MCP server, which enables AI models to fetch content from websites. This uses Readability.js which is a bit meh, particularly at navigating GitHub (which I try to use it for a lot). I appreciate there is the GitHub MCP, but a more general web browsing solution seems particularly nice here. Defuddle seems significantly better than Readability.js at processing pages nicely, and the model of having custom extractors to make particular sites work well seems great. It'd be neat if someone built a defuddle-based fetch MCP server. I might get round to this later if I get frustrated enough with the default fetch MCP 😄 | # idea: defuddle-based fetch MCP server · Issue #61 · kepano/defuddle URL: https://github.com/kepano/defuddle/issues/61 Open #61 [](https://github.com/domdomegg)## Description The MCP protocol is a standard for giving AI models access to tools. There's a default fetch MCP server, which enables AI models to fetch content from websites. This uses Readability.js which is a bit meh, particularly at navigating GitHub (which I try to use it for a lot). I appreciate there is the GitHub MCP, but a more general web browsing solution seems particularly nice here. Defuddle seems significantly better than Readability.js at processing pages nicely, and the model of having custom extractors to make particular sites work well seems great. It'd be neat if someone built a defuddle-based fetch MCP server. I might get round to this later if I get frustrated enough with the default fetch MCP 😄 |
Features
- Better Content Extraction: Uses Defuddle to remove webpage clutter and extract main content: while keeping things like the page title and key metadata
- Flexible Output: Supports both markdown and raw HTML output
- Chunked Reading: Supports pagination with
start_indexandmax_lengthparameters - Rich Metadata: Extracts title, author, publication date, word count, and more
Installation
Follow the instructions on install-mcp, which generates the right config for your MCP client (Claude Code, Claude Desktop, Cursor, Cline, VS Code, and more).
Components
Tools
- fetch
- Fetches a URL from the internet and extracts its contents as clean, markdown text using Defuddle
- Input parameters:
url(string, required): URL to fetchmax_length(number, optional): Maximum number of characters to return. Defaults to 5000.start_index(number, optional): Start content from this character index. Defaults to 0.raw(boolean, optional): Get raw content without markdown conversion. Defaults to false.
- Returns cleaned content with metadata including title, author, publication date, word count, domain, and processing time
Contributing
Pull requests are welcomed on GitHub! To get started:
- Install Git and Node.js
- Clone the repository
- Install dependencies with
npm install - Run
npm run testto run tests - Build with
npm run build
To add it to Claude Desktop, run npm run build then add the following configuration to your claude_desktop_config.json:
{
"mcpServers": {
"defuddle-fetch": {
"command": "node",
"args": [
"/path/to/clone/defuddle-fetch-mcp-server/dist/index.js"
]
}
}
}
Releases
Versions follow the semantic versioning spec.
To release:
- Use
npm version <major | minor | patch>to bump the version - Run
git push --follow-tagsto push with tags - Wait for GitHub Actions to publish to the NPM registry.
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Registryactive
Packagedefuddle-fetch-mcp-server
TransportSTDIO
UpdatedDec 5, 2025
