MCP Integration

Freight Rate Intelligence runs as a Model Context Protocol (MCP) server. Any MCP-compatible client (Claude Desktop, Cursor, etc.) can discover and call FRI skills as native tools.

Server Endpoint

https://freightrateintelligence.com/mcp

Authentication: Bearer token on the Authorization header, same as the REST API.

Claude Desktop Configuration

Add FRI to your claude_desktop_config.json:

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{
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  "mcpServers": {
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    "freight-rate-intelligence": {
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      "url": "https://freightrateintelligence.com/mcp",
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      "headers": {
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        "Authorization": "Bearer fri_your_key_here"
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      }
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    }
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  }
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}

Restart Claude. Your tools appear under the 🔨 menu.

Available Tools

Every skill is exposed as an MCP tool:

Resource Discovery

FRI exposes discoverable resources via MCP resources/list:

$
curl -X POST https://freightrateintelligence.com/mcp \
>
  -H "Authorization: Bearer fri_your_key_here" \
>
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
>
  -d '{"jsonrpc":"2.0","id":1,"method":"resources/list"}'

Available resources:

• fri://rates/national-average — National average rate per mile
• fri://diesel/padd-index — Current PADD regional diesel prices
• fri://usda_reefer — USDA AMS Refrigerated Truck Rates
• fri://factors/latest — Latest factor values across all sources

Example: Natural Language Query

Once connected, ask Claude:

“What’s the current rate for a reefer load from Dallas to Chicago, and how does it compare to the USDA spot rate?”

Claude will:

1. Call rate_lookup with equipment=REEFER
2. Call usda_reefer resource for the national index
3. Compose a response with both numbers and the market gap

Error Handling

All MCP errors return JSON-RPC standard error objects:

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{
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  "jsonrpc": "2.0",
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  "id": 1,
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  "error": {
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    "code": -32001,
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    "message": "Tier required: professional",
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    "data": {
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      "required_tier": "professional",
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      "current_tier": "starter"
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    }
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  }
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}

Common error codes:

Pricing

MCP tool calls count against your monthly request quota. Pricing is identical to REST:

Each tool invocation is one request, regardless of how many resources Claude reads behind the scenes.

Custom Integrations

Any MCP-compatible client works. See the MCP specification for details on building your own integration.