Installation

For Humans

Paste this into your AI agent (Claude Code, Cursor, etc.):

Help me install AutoSearch: https://raw.githubusercontent.com/0xmariowu/Autosearch/main/docs/install.md

For AI Agents

Goal

Install AutoSearch and configure the MCP server so the user’s agent has access to 40 search channels across academic papers, developer platforms, Chinese social media, and more.

⚠️ Boundaries

DO NOT run commands with sudo unless the user explicitly approved
DO NOT modify system files outside the user’s home directory
If something requires elevated permissions, tell the user and let them decide

Step 1: Install AutoSearch

# Option 1: npm wrapper — one-shot install + init (cross-platform)
npx autosearch-ai

# Option 2: curl install script (macOS / Linux only)
curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/0xmariowu/Autosearch/main/scripts/install.sh | bash

# Option 3: pip
pip install autosearch && autosearch init

# Option 4: pipx
pipx install autosearch && autosearch init

The npm package does not run init automatically during npm install. That is intentional: npm lifecycle scripts can execute code at install time, which is a known supply-chain risk. npx autosearch-ai triggers an explicit install + init flow with a y/N confirmation before fetching anything; the CI escape hatch is npx autosearch-ai --yes (do not put --yes in user-facing docs). Plain npm install -g autosearch-ai installs the wrapper but does not run init — use npx autosearch-ai for the one-shot flow, or run autosearch init if the Python CLI is already on PATH. The curl option runs autosearch init automatically.

This will:

Detect available LLM providers (Anthropic, OpenAI, Gemini, claude CLI)
Create ~/.autosearch/config.yaml
Auto-configure MCP clients. Claude Code uses claude mcp add when available; autosearch init --client claude --scope project writes project-bound .mcp.json.

Step 3: Check status

autosearch doctor

You’ll see a tiered report:

AutoSearch Channel Status
==========================================
Always-on (27/27)
  ✅ arxiv              1/1 methods available
  ✅ pubmed             1/1 methods available
  ✅ ddgs               1/1 methods available
  ... 24 more

API-key (0/11)
  ○  youtube            autosearch configure YOUTUBE_API_KEY <your-key>
  ○  bilibili           autosearch configure TIKHUB_API_KEY <your-key>
  ... 9 more

Login required (0/2)
  ○  xiaohongshu        autosearch login xhs
  ○  xueqiu             autosearch login xueqiu

Status: 27/40 channels ready

Optional: Unlock more channels

Ask the user which optional channels they want, then use these commands:

autosearch configure TIKHUB_API_KEY <your-key>
# Unlocks: xiaohongshu, douyin, weibo, zhihu, twitter, tiktok, bilibili, and more

If you use an AutoSearch TikHub proxy, configure the proxy URL and token instead. Together, AUTOSEARCH_PROXY_URL and AUTOSEARCH_PROXY_TOKEN satisfy TikHub channel availability without TIKHUB_API_KEY:

autosearch configure AUTOSEARCH_PROXY_URL <proxy-url>
autosearch configure AUTOSEARCH_PROXY_TOKEN <proxy-token>

Xiaohongshu with your own account (no TikHub fee)

autosearch login xhs
# Reads cookies from Chrome automatically.
# If it fails, use Cookie-Editor browser extension → Export → Header String, then:
autosearch login xhs --from-string "<paste-cookie-string>"

Twitter / X

autosearch login twitter

Bilibili

autosearch login bilibili

YouTube

autosearch configure YOUTUBE_API_KEY <your-key>
# Free key: console.cloud.google.com → Enable YouTube Data API v3

MCP server config

AutoSearch writes this automatically during init. For manual setup: Claude Code:

claude mcp add --transport stdio autosearch -- autosearch-mcp

For project-bound config without the claude CLI, run:

autosearch init --client claude --scope project

That writes <project>/.mcp.json. Cursor (~/.cursor/mcp.json):

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "autosearch": {
      "command": "autosearch-mcp",
      "type": "stdio"
    }
  }
}

Updating

npm install -g autosearch-ai   # npm
pipx upgrade autosearch        # pipx
pip install --upgrade autosearch  # pip

Troubleshooting

Channel returns empty results?

autosearch doctor  # check which channels are off and why

MCP server not found?

which autosearch-mcp  # verify it's on PATH
autosearch-mcp --help

Xiaohongshu returns code=300011 (account restricted)? Your XHS account was flagged. Re-login with a normal, actively-used account:

autosearch login xhs

Getting Started

Reference

Install

Installation

For Humans

For AI Agents

Goal

⚠️ Boundaries

Step 1: Install AutoSearch

Step 3: Check status

Optional: Unlock more channels

Xiaohongshu with your own account (no TikHub fee)

Twitter / X

Bilibili

YouTube

MCP server config

Updating

Troubleshooting

​Installation

​For Humans

​For AI Agents

​Goal

​⚠️ Boundaries

​Step 1: Install AutoSearch

​Step 3: Check status

​Optional: Unlock more channels

​Chinese social media (TikHub auth)

​Xiaohongshu with your own account (no TikHub fee)

​Twitter / X

​Bilibili

​YouTube

​MCP server config

​Updating

​Troubleshooting

Installation

For Humans

For AI Agents

Goal

⚠️ Boundaries

Step 1: Install AutoSearch

Step 3: Check status

Optional: Unlock more channels

Chinese social media (TikHub auth)

Xiaohongshu with your own account (no TikHub fee)

Twitter / X

Bilibili

YouTube

MCP server config

Updating

Troubleshooting