Podcast Index MCP Server

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The results shown in the demo above are sample data, not real Podcast Index responses.

About

Built and maintained by Conor Bronsdon for the Chain of Thought podcast production workflow, where it surfaces guest appearances and checks feed health during research. Conor hosts Chain of Thought, a show about AI infrastructure and how practitioners actually build with it. More tools for creators live in ai-tools-for-creators. Find Conor on X at @ConorBronsdon.

Companion tools:

• Transistor-MCP: manage podcast episodes, analytics, and transcripts on Transistor.fm
• substack-mcp: read posts and manage Substack drafts
• op3-mcp: report downloads, listener geography, and apps from OP3
• apple-podcasts-mcp: pull plays, followers, and per-episode listening from Apple Podcasts Connect
• gsc-mcp: query search performance, keywords, and sitemaps in Google Search Console
• podcast-benchmark: benchmark a show against its peers using only public data

Prerequisites

• Node.js 18+
• Free Podcast Index API credentials -- get them at api.podcastindex.org

Installation

git clone https://github.com/conorbronsdon/podcastindex-mcp.git
cd podcastindex-mcp
npm install
npm run build

Configuration

Claude Desktop

Add to your Claude Desktop config (claude_desktop_config.json):

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "podcastindex": {
      "command": "node",
      "args": ["/path/to/podcastindex-mcp/build/index.js"],
      "env": {
        "PODCASTINDEX_API_KEY": "your-api-key",
        "PODCASTINDEX_API_SECRET": "your-api-secret"
      }
    }
  }
}

Claude Code

Add to your project's .mcp.json:

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "podcastindex": {
      "command": "node",
      "args": ["/path/to/podcastindex-mcp/build/index.js"],
      "env": {
        "PODCASTINDEX_API_KEY": "your-api-key",
        "PODCASTINDEX_API_SECRET": "your-api-secret"
      }
    }
  }
}

Tools

This server is entirely read-only: every tool declares the MCP tool annotation readOnlyHint: true, so clients know no call mutates anything and can skip write-consent prompts.

Tool	Description
search_by_person	Search for episodes where a person appeared as host or guest. Returns matches across all indexed podcasts.
search_by_term	Full-text search across all podcasts by topic, show name, or keyword.
search_by_title	Search for podcasts by title.
podcast_by_feed_url	Look up a podcast by RSS feed URL. Returns feed ID, iTunes ID, categories, last update, and feed health.
podcast_by_feed_id	Look up a podcast by its Podcast Index feed ID. Returns full metadata.
podcast_by_itunes_id	Look up a podcast by its Apple Podcasts (iTunes) ID.
podcast_by_guid	Look up a podcast by its podcast:guid tag value.
trending_podcasts	Get currently trending podcasts, with optional language and category filters.
episodes_by_feed_id	Get episodes for a specific podcast by feed ID.
episode_by_id	Look up a single episode by its Podcast Index episode ID.
episodes_live	Get episodes that are currently live (actively streaming).
recent_episodes	Get the most recently published episodes across the entire index.
recent_feeds	Get the most recently updated podcast feeds across the index.
recent_new_feeds	Get podcast feeds newly added to the index.
value_by_feed_id	Get value4value (lightning payment) info for a podcast by feed ID.
value_by_feed_url	Get value4value (lightning payment) info for a podcast by feed URL.
categories_list	Get the full list of Podcast Index categories and their IDs.
stats_current	Get current aggregate statistics for the Podcast Index.

Typed errors

API failures are mapped to a typed error hierarchy (PodcastIndexError base, with AuthenticationError, RateLimitError, ValidationError, NotFoundError, and ServerError subclasses keyed off HTTP status) in src/errors.ts. Every tool call still returns the same isError: true response shape on failure — the typed hierarchy just makes the message specific to what went wrong (bad credentials vs. rate limiting vs. a malformed request, etc.) instead of a single generic "API error" string.

Example Prompts

Once configured, you can ask Claude things like:

• "Search Podcast Index for all episodes featuring Satya Nadella as a guest"
• "What are the trending technology podcasts right now?"
• "Look up the feed health for https://feeds.transistor.fm/chain-of-thought and list the last 5 episodes"

Development

Build the project:

npm run build

Watch for changes during development:

npm run watch

Adding a new tool

1. Add the API method to src/api-client.ts
2. Add type guard and argument types to src/types.ts
3. Add the tool definition and handler to src/tool-handlers.ts
4. Rebuild with npm run build

Contributing

Issues and pull requests are welcome. If there is a Podcast Index endpoint you want exposed as a tool, open an issue describing the use case, or follow the steps above and open a PR. Bug reports should include the tool name and the arguments you passed.

Acknowledgments

This server exists because of the free, open Podcast Index API and its documentation — all tools here are thin wrappers over that API.

The expanded endpoint coverage and typed-error design in this release were inspired by Craig Lawton's podcastindex-mcp-server, an earlier MCP server for the same API. No code from that project was used here; this server's implementation, tool schemas, and error-handling code were written independently against the official API docs.

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Disclaimer

This is an independent personal project, not affiliated with, sponsored by, or endorsed by any company. All views expressed are my own.

License

MIT