exa-x-search

name	exa-x-search
description	Search X/Twitter posts with Exa, filtered to x.com/twitter.com. Use for finding tweets or threads on a topic. NOTE: Exa's X coverage is limited (the tweet category was retired and X blocks crawlers), so results are often sparse — the skill is honest about this and suggests fallbacks. Runs a local script against the Exa API; no MCP server required.
license	MIT

X / Twitter Search (Exa)

Search posts on x.com / twitter.com via Exa. Calls the Exa REST API through a local script; no MCP server needed, only an EXA_API_KEY.

⚠️ Read this first — coverage is limited

Exa retired the tweet category, and X blocks most crawlers, so X/Twitter content is sparsely indexed. This skill:

• filters results to x.com/twitter.com client-side (--only-domains), so you never get off-domain noise dressed up as tweets;
• often returns few or zero results — that's expected, not a bug;
• prints a clear note and fallback suggestions when empty.

For reliable social/sentiment coverage, treat this as best-effort and use the fallbacks below.

Setup (once)

export EXA_API_KEY=your-key            # or EXA_API_KEY=... in a .env at the repo root

Get a key at https://dashboard.exa.ai/api-keys. Shared details: exa-native-base.

Run it

python scripts/x_search.py "<topic / handle / thread>" [-n N] [--json]

Examples:

python scripts/x_search.py "Anthropic Claude launch reactions" -n 15
python scripts/x_search.py "founder thread lessons scaling startup" -n 15

The script forces --include-domains x.com,twitter.com and --only-domains x.com,twitter.com. If it returns sources_reviewed: 0, that's the coverage limit, not an error.

Fallbacks when X coverage is thin

1. Find discussion about the topic on the open web (Reddit, HN, blogs, news):

   python ../exa-company-research/scripts/company_research.py "<topic> reaction analysis commentary" -c news -n 15
   python ../exa-native-base/scripts/exa.py search "<topic> discussion hacker news reddit" -n 15
   

2. Read a known thread/profile directly (if you have the URL):

   python ../exa-native-base/scripts/exa.py contents https://x.com/<user>/status/<id> --text
   

3. Use a dedicated X/Twitter API for real-time, exhaustive social data — Exa is not the right tool for that.

After you get results

• Verify each result is actually a relevant x.com/twitter.com post (the domain filter guarantees the host, not the relevance).
• Be explicit in your answer about coverage: state how many on-platform posts you found and whether you fell back to the open web.
• Deliver: author/handle · post link · one-line gist; note the recency.