AdYour product here, seen by people installing AI tools every day Sponsor slots open: 12 of 12, from $249 a month

cli vs exa

cli and exa are both search and web MCP servers. exa scores higher (100 vs 83 out of 100). exa has more GitHub stars (5.1k), and exa was updated more recently (2 days ago). The table compares them side by side.

cliexa
Score83 / 100100 / 100
What it doesCross-tool decision memory for AI coding agents: search your decision graph, check changes over MCP.Connect AI agents to Exa for web search, content fetching, and multi-step research.
PublisherCommunity: aligndottechVerified: exa.ai
GradesMaintenance A, Licence A, Quality CMaintenance A, Licence A, Quality A
npm downloads a week1,495Not on npm
RunsLocalRemote
Works withClaude Code, Claude Desktop, Cursor, Codex, Gemini CLI, VS Code, WindsurfClaude Code, Claude Desktop, Cursor, Codex, Gemini CLI, VS Code, Windsurf, ChatGPT
GitHub stars25,142
Last commit19 Oct 202619 Oct 2026
LicenceMITMIT
Listed since19 Oct 202619 Oct 2026
Install cliInstall exa

Questions

Is cli or exa more popular?

exa has more GitHub stars: 5,142.

Can I use cli and exa together?

Yes. AI assistants can load several MCP servers at once. Install both and the assistant picks the right one for each task.