Anna's Archive MCP Server (and CLI Tool)

An MCP server and CLI tool for searching and downloading documents from Anna's Archive

[!NOTE] Notwithstanding prevailing public sentiment regarding Anna's Archive, the platform serves as a comprehensive repository for automated retrieval of documents released under permissive licensing frameworks (including Creative Commons publications and public domain materials). This software does not endorse unauthorized acquisition of copyrighted content and should be regarded solely as a utility. Users are urged to respect the intellectual property rights of authors and acknowledge the considerable effort invested in document creation.

[!WARNING] Please refer to this section if any of the links lead to a non-functional Anna's Archive server.

Available Operations

Operation	MCP Tool	CLI Command	Example
Search for books by title, author, or topic	book_search	book-search	book-search "machine learning python"
Download a book by its MD5 hash	book_download	book-download	book-download abc123def456 "my-book.pdf"
Search for articles by DOI or keywords	article_search	article-search	article-search "10.1038/nature12345" or article-search "neural networks"
Download an article by its DOI	article_download	article-download	article-download "10.1038/nature12345"

Requirements

If you plan to use only the CLI tool, you need:

• A donation to Anna's Archive, which grants JSON API access
• An API key

If using the project as an MCP server, you also need an MCP client, such as Claude Desktop.

The environment should contain two variables:

• ANNAS_SECRET_KEY: The Anna's Archive API key.
• ANNAS_DOWNLOAD_PATH: The path where the documents should be downloaded.

Optionally, you can set:

• ANNAS_BASE_URL: The base URL of the Anna's Archive mirror to use (defaults to annas-archive.li).

These variables can also be stored in an .env file in the folder containing the binary.

Setup

Download the appropriate binary from the GitHub Releases section.

If you plan to use the tool for its MCP server functionality, you need to integrate it into your MCP client. If you are using Claude Desktop, please consider the following example configuration:

"anna-mcp": {
    "command": "/Users/iosifache/Downloads/annas-mcp",
    "args": ["mcp"],
    "env": {
        "ANNAS_SECRET_KEY": "feedfacecafebeef",
        "ANNAS_DOWNLOAD_PATH": "/Users/iosifache/Downloads"
    }
}

Demo

As an MCP Server

As a CLI Tool

Anna's Archive Mirrors

Anna's Archive has multiple mirrors, which may be innactive at times due to various reasons. Below is a list of known mirrors and their status as of January 2025:

Mirror	Type	Status
annas-archive.li	Official	Active
annas-archive.pm	Official	Active
annas-archive.in	Official	Active
annas-archive.org	Official	Innactive

Alternatively, use The Shadow Library Uptime Monitor to find statuses or alternative mirrors.

This project defaults to annas-archive.li. If that mirror is not working for you, please set the ANNAS_BASE_URL environment variable to one of the other mirrors.