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crewAI/lib/crewai-tools
Ishan Goswami 07c4a30f2e
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feat(crewai-tools): add highlights to ExaSearchTool, rename from EXASearchTool
* feat(crewai-tools): add highlights to ExaSearchTool, rename from EXASearchTool

- Add a highlights init param so agents can get token-efficient excerpts instead of full pages
- Rename EXASearchTool to ExaSearchTool; keep EXASearchTool as a deprecated alias so existing imports keep working
- Update the docs and example to use highlights as the recommended option
- Add a small note that says Exa is the fastest and most accurate web search API
- Add tests for the new highlights param and the deprecation alias

* fix(crewai-tools): import order and module-level Exa for tests

- Reorder std-lib imports so ruff is happy with force-sort-within-sections.
- Import Exa at module level (with a fallback) so the existing test mocks resolve.
  The lazy install prompt still works if exa_py is missing.
- Allow content and summary to be a dict, matching highlights.
- Trim test file to the cases this PR introduces (highlights param and the
  EXASearchTool deprecation alias). Existing init-shape tests stay.

Co-Authored-By: ishan <ishan@exa.ai>

* chore(crewai-tools): drop self-explanatory comment on schema alias

Co-Authored-By: ishan <ishan@exa.ai>

* docs(crewai-tools): default highlights to True, drop summary from examples

Co-Authored-By: ishan <ishan@exa.ai>

* docs(crewai-tools): simplify highlights examples to highlights=True

Co-Authored-By: ishan <ishan@exa.ai>

* feat(crewai-tools): add x-exa-integration header for usage tracking

Co-Authored-By: ishan <ishan@exa.ai>

* docs(crewai-tools): add Exa MCP section and resources links

Co-Authored-By: ishan <ishan@exa.ai>

---------

Co-authored-by: ishan <ishan@exa.ai>
Co-authored-by: Greyson LaLonde <greyson.r.lalonde@gmail.com>
Co-authored-by: Lorenze Jay <63378463+lorenzejay@users.noreply.github.com>
2026-05-01 21:25:23 +08:00
..
2026-05-01 02:57:37 +08:00

Logo of crewAI, two people rowing on a boat

CrewAI Tools

Empower your CrewAI agents with powerful, customizable tools to elevate their capabilities and tackle sophisticated, real-world tasks.

CrewAI Tools provide the essential functionality to extend your agents, helping you rapidly enhance your automations with reliable, ready-to-use tools or custom-built solutions tailored precisely to your needs.


Homepage | Documentation | Examples | Community


Available Tools

CrewAI provides an extensive collection of powerful tools ready to enhance your agents:

  • File Management: FileReadTool, FileWriteTool
  • Web Scraping: ScrapeWebsiteTool, SeleniumScrapingTool
  • Database Integrations: MySQLSearchTool
  • Vector Database Integrations: MongoDBVectorSearchTool, QdrantVectorSearchTool, WeaviateVectorSearchTool
  • API Integrations: SerperApiTool, ExaSearchTool
  • AI-powered Tools: DallETool, VisionTool, StagehandTool

And many more robust tools to simplify your agent integrations.


Creating Custom Tools

CrewAI offers two straightforward approaches to creating custom tools:

Subclassing BaseTool

Define your tool by subclassing:

from crewai.tools import BaseTool

class MyCustomTool(BaseTool):
    name: str = "Tool Name"
    description: str = "Detailed description here."

    def _run(self, *args, **kwargs):
        # Your tool logic here

Using the tool Decorator

Quickly create lightweight tools using decorators:

from crewai import tool

@tool("Tool Name")
def my_custom_function(input):
    # Tool logic here
    return output

CrewAI Tools and MCP

CrewAI Tools supports the Model Context Protocol (MCP). It gives you access to thousands of tools from the hundreds of MCP servers out there built by the community.

Before you start using MCP with CrewAI tools, you need to install the mcp extra dependencies:

pip install crewai-tools[mcp]
# or
uv add crewai-tools --extra mcp

To quickly get started with MCP in CrewAI you have 2 options:

Option 1: Fully managed connection

In this scenario we use a contextmanager (with statement) to start and stop the the connection with the MCP server. This is done in the background and you only get to interact with the CrewAI tools corresponding to the MCP server's tools.

For an STDIO based MCP server:

from mcp import StdioServerParameters
from crewai_tools import MCPServerAdapter

serverparams = StdioServerParameters(
    command="uvx",
    args=["--quiet", "pubmedmcp@0.1.3"],
    env={"UV_PYTHON": "3.12", **os.environ},
)

with MCPServerAdapter(serverparams) as tools:
    # tools is now a list of CrewAI Tools matching 1:1 with the MCP server's tools
    agent = Agent(..., tools=tools)
    task = Task(...)
    crew = Crew(..., agents=[agent], tasks=[task])
    crew.kickoff(...)

For an SSE based MCP server:

serverparams = {"url": "http://localhost:8000/sse"}
with MCPServerAdapter(serverparams) as tools:
    # tools is now a list of CrewAI Tools matching 1:1 with the MCP server's tools
    agent = Agent(..., tools=tools)
    task = Task(...)
    crew = Crew(..., agents=[agent], tasks=[task])
    crew.kickoff(...)

Option 2: More control over the MCP connection

If you need more control over the MCP connection, you can instanciate the MCPServerAdapter into an mcp_server_adapter object which can be used to manage the connection with the MCP server and access the available tools.

important: in this case you need to call mcp_server_adapter.stop() to make sure the connection is correctly stopped. We recommend that you use a try ... finally block run to make sure the .stop() is called even in case of errors.

Here is the same example for an STDIO MCP Server:

from mcp import StdioServerParameters
from crewai_tools import MCPServerAdapter

serverparams = StdioServerParameters(
    command="uvx",
    args=["--quiet", "pubmedmcp@0.1.3"],
    env={"UV_PYTHON": "3.12", **os.environ},
)

try:
    mcp_server_adapter = MCPServerAdapter(serverparams)
    tools = mcp_server_adapter.tools
    # tools is now a list of CrewAI Tools matching 1:1 with the MCP server's tools
    agent = Agent(..., tools=tools)
    task = Task(...)
    crew = Crew(..., agents=[agent], tasks=[task])
    crew.kickoff(...)

# ** important ** don't forget to stop the connection
finally: 
    mcp_server_adapter.stop()

And finally the same thing but for an SSE MCP Server:

from mcp import StdioServerParameters
from crewai_tools import MCPServerAdapter

serverparams = {"url": "http://localhost:8000/sse"}

try:
    mcp_server_adapter = MCPServerAdapter(serverparams)
    tools = mcp_server_adapter.tools
    # tools is now a list of CrewAI Tools matching 1:1 with the MCP server's tools
    agent = Agent(..., tools=tools)
    task = Task(...)
    crew = Crew(..., agents=[agent], tasks=[task])
    crew.kickoff(...)

# ** important ** don't forget to stop the connection
finally: 
    mcp_server_adapter.stop()

Considerations & Limitations

Staying Safe with MCP

Always make sure that you trust the MCP Server before using it. Using an STDIO server will execute code on your machine. Using SSE is still not a silver bullet with many injection possible into your application from a malicious MCP server.

Limitations

  • At this time we only support tools from MCP Server not other type of primitives like prompts, resources...
  • We only return the first text output returned by the MCP Server tool using .content[0].text

Why Use CrewAI Tools?

  • Simplicity & Flexibility: Easy-to-use yet powerful enough for complex workflows.
  • Rapid Integration: Seamlessly incorporate external services, APIs, and databases.
  • Enterprise Ready: Built for stability, performance, and consistent results.

Contribution Guidelines

We welcome contributions from the community!

  1. Fork and clone the repository.
  2. Create a new branch (git checkout -b feature/my-feature).
  3. Commit your changes (git commit -m 'Add my feature').
  4. Push your branch (git push origin feature/my-feature).
  5. Open a pull request.

Developer Quickstart

pip install crewai[tools]

Development Setup

  • Install dependencies: uv sync
  • Run tests: uv run pytest
  • Run static type checking: uv run pyright
  • Set up pre-commit hooks: pre-commit install

Support and Community

Join our rapidly growing community and receive real-time support:

Build smarter, faster, and more powerful AI solutions—powered by CrewAI Tools.