tripadvisor-mcp
MCP server for the TripAdvisor Terra API — travel data for Claude. Search hotels, restaurants, and attractions by name or coordinates, then pull full details, photos, and reviews, all over stdio. (Terra is TripAdvisor's current API; the legacy Content API is sunset on 2026-08-31.)
Developed and maintained by AI (Claude Code). Use at your own discretion.
Quick start
{
"mcpServers": {
"tripadvisor": {
"command": "npx",
"args": ["-y", "@chrischall/tripadvisor-mcp"],
"env": { "TRIPADVISOR_API_KEY": "your-terra-api-key-here" }
}
}
}
Get a key at tripadvisor.com/developers. The free Discover tier is pay-as-you-go (10 QPS, 10,000 calls/day); responses are cached in-memory to stretch it. Make sure it's a Terra key — a legacy Content API key returns 403.
Tools
| Tool | What it does |
|---|---|
ta_search_locations | Search locations by name (optionally scoped by category, country/geo/postal code) — paginated; compact:true for slim summaries |
ta_search_nearby | Find locations near a lat/lon+radius, a location_id+radius, or inside a sw/ne bounding box (category, min rating, sort) — compact:true supported |
ta_get_location_details | Full details: names, descriptions, address, coordinates, traveler ratings, phone, listing URLs |
ta_get_locations | Batch — details for multiple location ids in one call (cheaper than N detail calls); compact:true supported |
ta_get_location_photos | Photos with multi-size image URLs, source, and dimensions — paginated |
ta_get_location_reviews | Traveler reviews — paginated |
ta_web_healthcheck | Diagnose the optional tripadvisor.com browser-bridge connection (see below) |
ta_web_get_location | Location details (rating, address, coords, phone, photo) read from the public page via the browser bridge — no API key needed |
All tools are read-only — Terra has no write endpoints.
Browser bridge (optional)
ta_web_healthcheck is the first tool of an optional second tier that reaches
tripadvisor.com's consumer site (bot-walled, so unreachable server-side) by
routing same-origin fetches through your signed-in browser tab via the
ContextMint Bridge browser extension, installed from
its releases page
(Chrome: download the chrome zip and load it unpacked from chrome://extensions
with Developer mode on; Safari isn't available yet — it will ship inside the
ContextMint app, which has no public download — so use Chrome for now). It needs
the extension installed and a one-time pairing approval; the Content API tools
above never touch the bridge.
ContextMint Bridge is the fetchproxy browser extension under its new name, from
the same maintainer — fetchproxy's own README
(https://github.com/chrischall/fetchproxy#extension) points to it. Its source is
public at https://github.com/nullnet-app/contextmint-bridge: build it yourself,
or check a release zip against the .sha256 file published beside it
(shasum -a 256 -c contextmint-bridge-chrome-<version>.zip.sha256).
ta_web_get_location uses this bridge to read a location's details straight
from its public TripAdvisor page — so it works without an API key,
covering attractions, hotels, and restaurants. It returns core business data
(rating, review count, address, coordinates, phone, primary photo, listing
URL) but not individual review text. Request shapes are pinned in
docs/TRIPADVISOR-WEB-API.md.
Environment
| Var | Required | Purpose |
|---|---|---|
TRIPADVISOR_API_KEY | for the Terra tools | Terra API key, sent as the X-API-Key header. The ta_web_* tools work without it. |
TRIPADVISOR_CACHE_TTL | no | Seconds to cache search responses (default: 300; 0 disables). |
TRIPADVISOR_STATIC_CACHE_TTL | no | Seconds to cache details/photos/reviews (default: 3600; 0 disables). |
TRIPADVISOR_REQUEST_TIMEOUT_MS | no | Per-request timeout for the optional browser bridge (default: 30000). |
TRIPADVISOR_DEBUG_LOG | no | Set to 1 to log browser-bridge requests to stderr. |
Development
npm install
npm run build # tsc + esbuild bundle
npm test # vitest (no real network)
Endpoint request shapes are pinned in docs/TRIPADVISOR-API.md. With a key in .env, node scripts/live-probe.mjs exercises every read path through the built client.
License
MIT