Best MCP Servers for Developers in 2026: Costs Compared
Eight MCP servers for code, tests, production errors and backend work, with the free tier and the paid plan behind each one, checked on vendor pages in October 2026.
Short answer: install GitHub's MCP server first, because it is free and covers pull requests, issues and workflows. Add Context7 for current library docs: its Free plan gives 1,000 API calls a month, and Pro is $10 per seat a month. For production work, Sentry has a free Developer plan for one user, and Supabase is free to start, with Pro at $25 a month. Prices checked on vendor pages in October 2026.
Every server on this list installs for free. What you pay for is the account behind it, so the real decisions are which account to connect and how much access to give the agent. Connect three, add the rest for a specific task, and keep each scope narrow.
Key facts8 tools compared: GitHub MCP server, Context7, Playwright MCP, Chrome DevTools MCP, Sentry…
- 8 tools compared: GitHub MCP server, Context7, Playwright MCP, Chrome DevTools MCP, Sentry MCP, Supabase MCP, Linear MCP, Brave Search API
- Context7 (best for: Current library docs when the model would otherwise guess an API from old training data): Free for 1,000 API calls a month; Pro is priced per seat, with 2,000 calls per seat
- Playwright MCP (best for: Reproducing a UI bug or walking through a sign-up flow in a real browser): Free and open source (Apache-2.0); you pay only for the machine that runs the browser
- Chrome DevTools MCP (best for: Performance traces, console errors and network calls from a live Chrome tab): Free and open source (Apache-2.0); no subscription, but usage statistics are on by default
An MCP server lets an AI coding agent call a real system: your repository, a browser tab, an error tracker or a database. The Model Context Protocol is the shared plug, so one server works in every client that speaks it, including Claude Code and Cursor. Our best AI coding assistants guide covers the agents themselves. This one covers the servers a developer's day actually reaches for, and what each one costs once the free part runs out.
Toolradar data: Toolradar counted 346 published tools with MCP in their name, slug or tagline as of 21 September 2026, and 285 of them (82%) offer a free path. That field is too wide for a working developer, so this list keeps eight servers. Toolradar's own MCP servers guide compares the cost of 16 of them, and it is the source of the count above.
Start with three. Add each further server for a specific task, keep its scope narrow, and treat every connection as access to a live account.
Top Picks
Based on features, real-world fit, and value for money.
GitHub's own server for repositories, pull requests, issues and workflows, with a hosted endpoint that signs in through OAuth.
Free (MIT-licensed server); GitHub Free costs nothing and includes unlimited public and private repos
Pull requests, issues and CI status without leaving the agent's session
Pulls version-specific documentation for a library on demand, which cuts the invented method names that generated code often contains.
Free for 1,000 API calls a month; Pro is priced per seat, with 2,000 calls per seat
Current library docs when the model would otherwise guess an API from old training data
Microsoft's browser server that drives a real browser through the accessibility tree, so a text-only model can follow the page.
Free and open source (Apache-2.0); you pay only for the machine that runs the browser
Reproducing a UI bug or walking through a sign-up flow in a real browser
| Tool | Pricing | Best for |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub MCP server | Free (MIT-licensed server); GitHub Free costs nothing and includes unlimited public and private repos | Pull requests, issues and CI status without leaving the agent's session |
| Context7 | Free for 1,000 API calls a month; Pro is priced per seat, with 2,000 calls per seat | Current library docs when the model would otherwise guess an API from old training data |
| Playwright MCP | Free and open source (Apache-2.0); you pay only for the machine that runs the browser | Reproducing a UI bug or walking through a sign-up flow in a real browser |
| Chrome DevTools MCP | Free and open source (Apache-2.0); no subscription, but usage statistics are on by default | Performance traces, console errors and network calls from a live Chrome tab |
| Sentry MCP | Developer is free for one user with MCP access; Team is $26 a month billed annually | Pulling a production stack trace and its release into the fix |
| Supabase MCP | Free plan at no charge; Pro from $25 a month with compute credits included | Schema changes, SQL checks and auth settings on one Supabase project |
| Linear MCP | Free for up to 250 issues; Basic is $10 per user a month, billed yearly | Turning an issue into a branch plan without copying the spec by hand |
| Brave Search API | $5 per 1,000 search requests, with a monthly free credit | Current web results for a question the model cannot answer from its training data |
Pricing read from each vendor's own pricing page, checked Oct 2026. Every vendor here publishes a price.
GitHub MCP server
GitHub's own server for repositories, pull requests, issues and workflows, with a hosted endpoint that signs in through OAuth.
- Pricing
- Free (MIT-licensed server); GitHub Free costs nothing and includes unlimited public and private repos
Best for: Pull requests, issues and CI status without leaving the agent's session
Pros
- The hosted endpoint signs in with OAuth, so no personal access token has to sit in a config file
- The --read-only flag skips every write tool, so an agent can review a pull request without commenting on it or merging it
- The server works with a free GitHub account, and GitHub prices its Copilot add-on separately
Cons
- Each enabled toolset usually adds tool definitions to the context before the first prompt, so turn on only the toolsets a task needs
- Write access follows the account you sign in with, so an agent connected as an organization owner can do what that owner can do
Context7
Pulls version-specific documentation for a library on demand, which cuts the invented method names that generated code often contains.
- Pricing
- Free for 1,000 API calls a month; Pro is priced per seat, with 2,000 calls per seat
Best for: Current library docs when the model would otherwise guess an API from old training data
Pros
- The Free plan gives one person 1,000 API calls a month at $0, enough to test it on a real project
- Public libraries need no repository access: the agent asks for a library by name and gets its docs back
- Pro doubles the included calls to 2,000 per seat, and Pro users are never blocked once they pass that number
Cons
- Private repository parsing is billed per million tokens on top of the seat price, and the Free plan does not parse private repositories
- Coverage stops at the libraries it has indexed, so an internal package or a very new release can come back with nothing useful
Playwright MCP
Microsoft's browser server that drives a real browser through the accessibility tree, so a text-only model can follow the page.
- Pricing
- Free and open source (Apache-2.0); you pay only for the machine that runs the browser
Best for: Reproducing a UI bug or walking through a sign-up flow in a real browser
Pros
- It reads each page as an accessibility snapshot by default, so the model needs no vision model to follow a flow
- The --isolated flag keeps the browser profile in memory, so cookies and logins are discarded when the session ends
- By default the browser runs on your own machine, so the test data stays with you
Cons
- A text snapshot misses what it cannot describe, so an overlapping element or a broken image can pass a check unseen
- The browser sees whatever the page shows, including a logged-in session, so keep it away from production accounts
Chrome DevTools MCP
Google's server that gives an agent Chrome DevTools for performance traces, console output, network requests and debugging.
- Pricing
- Free and open source (Apache-2.0); no subscription, but usage statistics are on by default
Best for: Performance traces, console errors and network calls from a live Chrome tab
Pros
- It records performance traces and extracts insights, so a slow page gets a measured cause instead of a guess
- Console messages come back with source-mapped stack traces, which points the agent at the right file
- The agent reads the same browser evidence a developer would read by hand, so the two can compare notes
Cons
- Google collects usage statistics by default; add --no-usage-statistics to switch that off
- Performance tools can send trace URLs to the Google CrUX API, and --no-performance-crux stops that
Sentry MCP
Sentry's hosted server for searching errors, reading stack traces, checking performance and triaging issues from the agent session.
- Pricing
- Developer is free for one user with MCP access; Team is $26 a month billed annually
Best for: Pulling a production stack trace and its release into the fix
Pros
- It signs in with OAuth on the first connection, so no token sits in your configuration
- The URL takes an organization or project slug, and Sentry recommends the project scope when it is possible
- The Developer plan covers one user with 5k errors a month, enough to wire a side project to the server and test it
Cons
- Error events can carry request details and user information, so the connection should cover only the project you are debugging
- The Team plan is the step that raises the included errors to 50k a month, which matters once a whole team connects
Supabase MCP
Supabase's hosted server for projects, databases, auth, storage and SQL, with URL flags that narrow it to one project or to read-only.
- Pricing
- Free plan at no charge; Pro from $25 a month with compute credits included
Best for: Schema changes, SQL checks and auth settings on one Supabase project
Pros
- It signs in through OAuth at mcp.supabase.com/mcp, so there is no personal access token to rotate
- Adding ?project_ref= limits the server to one project and turns off the account-level tools
- Adding ?read_only=true runs every query as a read-only Postgres user
Cons
- Supabase's own guide warns that production projects can contain sensitive data and advises connecting only when the task needs it
- The Free plan allows two active projects and pauses a project after one week of inactivity, so it suits tests more than a live app
Linear MCP
Linear's hosted server for reading and updating issues from the agent session, with a read-only endpoint for context-only work.
- Pricing
- Free for up to 250 issues; Basic is $10 per user a month, billed yearly
Best for: Turning an issue into a branch plan without copying the spec by hand
Pros
- It is hosted at mcp.linear.app/mcp and signs in with OAuth 2.1, so the setup needs no key in a config file
- The read-only endpoint at mcp.linear.app/mcp/readonly suits an agent that only needs the ticket's context
- A bearer token or a Linear API key works as an alternative to the interactive OAuth setup
Cons
- The default endpoint is read-write, so an agent can change issue state unless you point it at the read-only URL
- Linear publishes no plan list for its MCP server, so check your workspace plan before you rely on it
Brave Search API
Brave's search API returns web results with URLs and text, so an agent can answer a fresh question and show where the answer came from.
- Pricing
- $5 per 1,000 search requests, with a monthly free credit
Best for: Current web results for a question the model cannot answer from its training data
Pros
- The monthly free credit covers about 1,000 searches at list price before any charge applies
- Brave calls its index the largest independent index of the web, so results do not depend on another search engine's index
- The official server replaced the archived reference server, so a new setup points at maintained code
Cons
- Every query is billed, so an agent that searches in a loop can use the monthly credit in one long session
- Brave's answers endpoint is a separate product, so read the endpoint name before you wire it in
What it is
An MCP server is a small program that offers tools to an AI client over the Model Context Protocol. The client lists the tools, the model picks one with arguments, and the server runs it against the real system and returns the result. A GitHub server might list open pull requests, a Sentry server might fetch one error with its stack trace, and a browser server might click a button and read the page back.
Some servers run on your machine, such as Playwright and Chrome DevTools. Others are hosted by the vendor and sign in with OAuth, such as GitHub, Sentry, Supabase and Linear. OAuth keeps a personal token out of your config file, but the hosted server then holds a live connection to the account, so the scope settings matter more. If your agent runs on a subscription, that bill is separate: see our Claude Code pricing guide for the agent side.
Why it matters
The connector is free, the account behind it is not. Every server here installs at no cost. The bill comes from the service it reads, so the paid tier of Context7, Supabase, Sentry or Linear is where the spending starts. Price the account you connect, not the connector. A stack of free servers can still need a paid plan the first time a team member needs more than the free allowance, as our Supabase pricing guide sets out.
Access is the real risk. A connected agent reads what the server returns and acts with the permissions the server holds. Read-only switches exist for GitHub, Supabase and Linear, and Sentry can be limited to one project. Use them before the first session, not after an incident. Our Sentry review covers the plans behind its error quota.
Key features to look for
Pricing
Methodology: we read each vendor's own pricing page, documentation or project repository in October 2026, using the US list price. Dupple has not run these servers in a lab, so the prices and features here are vendor statements, and the page links each source. The items follow the order a developer usually reaches for them, from the server used on every coding day to the one needed for a specific job.
On the free side, GitHub's pricing page lists the Free plan with unlimited public and private repositories. Context7's plans page lists Free for 1,000 API calls a month, and Pro at $10 per seat a month with 2,000 calls per seat. Private repository parsing is billed at $5 per 1M tokens on the paid line. Sentry's pricing page lists Developer free for one user, and Team at $26 a month billed annually. If you pay for an editor as well, our Cursor pricing guide covers that bill.
On the paid side, Supabase's pricing page lists Free with no monthly charge and Pro from $25 a month with compute credits included. Linear's pricing page lists Free for up to 250 issues and Basic at $10 per user a month, billed yearly. Brave's API page lists search pricing per 1,000 requests, with a monthly free credit. Playwright MCP and Chrome DevTools MCP are Apache-2.0 licensed with no subscription. Toolradar also lists these tools: GitHub, Playwright, Sentry, Supabase and Linear.
| Plan | Price | Best for |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub Free | Free | Unlimited public and private repositories, the base for the GitHub MCP server |
| Context7 Free | Free | 1,000 API calls a month for one person, with no private repository parsing |
| Context7 Pro | $10 per seat a month | 2,000 API calls per seat, with extra calls billed per 1,000 |
| Sentry Developer | Free | One user and 5k errors a month, with MCP access listed on the plan |
| Sentry Team | $26 a month, billed annually | 50k errors a month, with the Developer features included |
| Supabase Free | Free | Two active projects; a project pauses after one week of inactivity |
| Supabase Pro | $25 a month | Includes compute credits, enough for one Micro instance |
| Linear Free | Free | Unlimited members, two teams and up to 250 issues |
| Brave Search API | $5 per 1,000 requests | Includes a monthly free credit, applied automatically |
| Playwright and Chrome DevTools MCP | Free, open source | Apache-2.0 licensed; no subscription and no vendor account needed |
The bottom line
For most developers, the stack that earns its place is GitHub, Context7 and Playwright: free to install and useful on every coding day. Add Sentry when production errors are part of the job, and Supabase when you own the database, with the scope limits switched on. Keep Linear and Brave Search for the tasks that need a ticket or a live web answer.
Check the paid lines before you commit. Context7 Pro, Supabase Pro and Sentry Team each change the bill once a team depends on them, and prices move. Cite this: Devshot, "Best MCP Servers for Developers in 2026: Costs Compared", October 2026.
Frequently asked questions
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