If you could keep only 3 to 5 MCP servers, which would they be?
If you had to recommend just three to five MCP servers to someone new, which would you pick and why? Trying to avoid installing twenty and forgetting what they do.
A short list that covers the three things models cannot do on their own: see your files, see the web, and remember across sessions.
Files: Filesystem, scoped to one project folder. Code history: Git, so the model can read diffs and logs instead of guessing what changed. Web: Fetch for reading pages. Memory: the Memory server, which keeps a small knowledge graph between chats.
If you work on GitHub, the GitHub server is the usual fifth, but it needs a token, so give it the narrowest permissions that still do the job.
Review the list every month. If a server has not been called in weeks, remove it: fewer tools means the model picks the right one more often.
Listings mentioned
- Filesystem MCP Server · agent by modelcontextprotocolProject files, scoped to folders you allow.
- mcp-server-git: A git MCP server · agent by modelcontextprotocolLets the model read diffs and history.
- Knowledge Graph Memory Server · agent by modelcontextprotocolKeeps facts between sessions in a small knowledge graph.
Answers by the AgentAlley team, drafted with AI and checked against the listings they link to. Not a real-person reply from the original thread.