Bright Data MCP Server

A full-featured Model Context Protocol (MCP) server that lets an AI agent browse and extract data from any public website through Bright Data's Web Access APIs.

All heavy lifting — proxy rotation, browser fingerprinting, CAPTCHA solving, and JavaScript rendering — happens on Bright Data's cloud infrastructure, so this server runs fine on machines that can't (or shouldn't) run a browser locally. The Browser API tool uses puppeteer-core, which speaks CDP to a remote browser and never downloads or launches Chromium on your machine.

Tools

Related MCP server: Thordata MCP Server

Prerequisites

1. A Bright Data account and an API token (Account settings → API tokens, or https://brightdata.com/cp/setting/users).

2. One or more zones created under Web Access APIs in the control panel:

   • a Web Unlocker zone (for unlocker_* and serp_search)

   • a SERP API zone (for serp_search)

   • a Browser API zone (for browser_scrape) — copy its USER:PASS from the zone's Overview tab

   • a Dataset id (gd_...) from https://brightdata.com/cp/datasets for the Crawl / Web Scraper tools

3. Node.js 18 or newer.

Bright Data's free tier includes monthly credits; adding a payment method unlocks API access and grants a small verification credit. Usage of all of these APIs is billed by Bright Data per their pricing.

Install & build

npm install
npm run build

Configure

Copy .env.example to .env and fill in your values:

cp .env.example .env

The server reads variables from the real process environment. If you keep them in .env, load it before launching (e.g. node --env-file=.env dist/index.js on Node 20+, or via your MCP client's env block below).

Run

# Node 20+ can load the .env file directly:
node --env-file=.env dist/index.js

# or rely on environment variables already exported in your shell:
npm start

Use it from an MCP client

Add this to your client's MCP config (Claude Desktop, Cursor, etc.). Pass secrets through the env block rather than committing them:

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "brightdata": {
      "command": "node",
      "args": ["/absolute/path/to/brightdata-mcp/dist/index.js"],
      "env": {
        "BRIGHTDATA_API_KEY": "your_api_key_here",
        "BRIGHTDATA_UNLOCKER_ZONE": "web_unlocker1",
        "BRIGHTDATA_SERP_ZONE": "serp_api1",
        "BRIGHTDATA_BROWSER_AUTH": "brd-customer-XXXX-zone-YYYY:zzzz",
        "BRIGHTDATA_DATASET_ID": "gd_xxxxxxxx"
      }
    }
  }
}

Example tool calls

Fetch a page as Markdown:

{ "tool": "unlocker_scrape", "arguments": { "url": "https://example.com", "data_format": "markdown" } }

Search Google:

{ "tool": "serp_search", "arguments": { "query": "best laptops 2026", "engine": "google", "num": 20 } }

Drive a cloud browser through a CAPTCHA and screenshot it:

{
  "tool": "browser_scrape",
  "arguments": {
    "url": "https://site-with-captcha.example",
    "solve_captcha": true,
    "screenshot": true,
    "actions": [
      { "type": "wait_for_selector", "selector": "#results" },
      { "type": "click", "selector": "button.load-more" },
      { "type": "scroll" }
    ]
  }
}

How it maps to the Bright Data docs

• Unlocker / SERP → POST https://api.brightdata.com/request with { zone, url, format, method, country, data_format }. Async adds ?async=true and is retrieved via GET /unblocker/get_result.

• Crawl / Web Scraper → POST /datasets/v3/trigger?dataset_id=..., polled via GET /datasets/v3/progress/{id} and downloaded via GET /datasets/v3/snapshot/{id}.

• Browser API → puppeteer.connect({ browserWSEndpoint: "wss://USER:PASS@brd.superproxy.io:9222" }) plus Bright Data's custom CDP commands: Captcha.solve, Captcha.setAutoSolve, Unblocker.enableAdBlock, Proxy.useSession, Emulation.setDevice, Browser.getSessionId.

Responsible use

This server accesses public web data through a paid, compliant commercial service. Respect each target site's Terms of Service and robots.txt, applicable laws (e.g. data-protection rules), and Bright Data's Acceptable Use Policy. Don't use it to access content behind logins/authentication you aren't authorized to use, or to collect personal data without a lawful basis.

License

MIT