Recipe · ~5 min · no coding required

Give your AI assistant live web search

Your assistant answers from training data that is months old. You want it to search the web right now — news, prices, fresh documentation — and answer with sources.

You need

  • · An AI app that supports skills: Claude Desktop, Claude Code, Cursor, VS Code — don't have one yet?
  • · The Brave Search skill (free API key from Brave Search API)
  • · About 5 minutes

Step by step

  1. 1
    Get a free API key

    Sign up at brave.com/search/api and create a key on the free plan — no credit card needed. Copy the key, it looks like a long random string.

  2. 2
    Install the Brave Search skill

    Use the install widget below and replace YOUR_BRAVE_API_KEY in the snippet with your real key before saving.

  3. 3
    Restart and search

    Fully restart the app, then paste the prompt below.

Install the Brave Search skill

You need: an AI app that supports skills (pick yours above) · Node.js (LTS) — one-time install from nodejs.org. Check with `node -v` in a terminal. · An API key (BRAVE_API_KEY) — free tier available, get it at https://brave.com/search/api/

Open Settings → Developer → Edit Config in Claude Desktop (this opens claude_desktop_config.json) and merge this block, then fully restart the app:

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "brave-search": {
      "command": "npx",
      "args": [
        "-y",
        "@brave/brave-search-mcp-server"
      ],
      "env": {
        "BRAVE_API_KEY": "YOUR_BRAVE_API_KEY"
      }
    }
  }
}

Before saving, replace YOUR_BRAVE_API_KEY with your key from Brave Search API (free tier).

The prompt

Search the web for the latest news from this week about EU AI regulation. Summarize the three most important developments and give me the source link for each.

What you should see

The assistant runs real searches (you'll see the search tool light up), then answers with this week's developments and clickable source links — content that cannot come from training data.

Last reviewed 2026-06-10

If it doesn't work

I get an authentication or 401 error.
The API key wasn't picked up. Make sure you replaced the YOUR_BRAVE_API_KEY placeholder in the configuration with your actual key (no quotes missing, no trailing spaces) and restarted the app.
Searches work but results seem thin.
The free tier is rate-limited (about one query per second). For heavy research sessions, space out requests or upgrade the plan.
The assistant answers without searching.
Ask explicitly: "Search the web for …". If it still doesn't, check that the skill shows up in the tools menu — if not, see the Node.js note in the install widget.

Run a website? Make sure agents can read it.

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