MCP Web Search & Scrape in Visual Studio

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Requirements

• Visual Studio 2022 version 17.14 or newer, or Visual Studio 2026.
• GitHub Copilot signed in, with Copilot Chat in Agent mode.

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Quick setup

1. Create %USERPROFILE%\.mcp.json to make Firecrawl available in every solution, or <SOLUTIONDIR>\.mcp.json to scope it to one solution and share it through source control.
2. Add this configuration and save the file:

{
  "servers": {
    "firecrawl": {
      "url": "https://mcp.firecrawl.dev/v2/mcp-oauth"
    }
  }
}

3. In the file, select Authentication Required in the CodeLens above the server, then complete the Firecrawl sign-in in your browser. If you do not see the CodeLens, enable it in Tools, Options, Text Editor, CodeLens.
4. In Copilot Chat, switch to Agent mode, open Tools, and enable the Firecrawl tools. Visual Studio disables new MCP tools until you turn them on.

{
  "servers": {
    "firecrawl": {
      "command": "npx",
      "args": ["-y", "firecrawl-mcp@3.33.2"],
      "env": {
        "FIRECRAWL_API_KEY": "fc-YOUR-API-KEY"
      }
    }
  }
}

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Try it

Search the web for the latest ASP.NET Core release notes and summarize the sources.

Scrape https://firecrawl.dev and explain what it does.

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What you can do

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Troubleshooting

• No Firecrawl tools in the picker: open the tool picker and enable them. Visual Studio resets tool approvals whenever a server’s tool list changes.
• Sign-in is required again: in .mcp.json, select Manage Authentication in the CodeLens for the firecrawl server.
• The file is ignored: the top-level key in Visual Studio files is servers, not mcpServers.
• Another definition of firecrawl exists: Visual Studio also reads .vscode\mcp.json and .cursor\mcp.json in the solution folder. Keep one Firecrawl entry.