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Convert USD to cedis, rand and shillings in Claude with real rates

"What is 500 dollars in cedis" is a question people ask search engines dozens of times a day, and the answers they get are ad-covered converter sites with stale widgets. If you already work in Claude or Cursor, the MCP currency server answers it in one tool call - and, unlike a widget, it can convert a whole list, look up a historical date, and hand the numbers back in a form you can paste into an invoice.

The pairs people actually ask about

The server quotes everything off the euro, the way the European Central Bank publishes its daily reference rates, so USD to GHS is computed as one rate path (USD to EUR, EUR to GHS) from the same daily file. That keeps every pair consistent: USD to ZAR, USD to KES, EUR to CAD, GBP to NGN - any combination of the roughly 30 currencies the ECB publishes is a valid pair, on the same day's rates, with no per-pair scraping.

"Convert 500 USD to GHS" returns the amount and the rate used. "Convert 250 USD to ZAR, KES and NGN" is one convert_many call, not three lookups. "What was the USD to GHS rate on the 3rd" is rate_on, so back-dated invoices and expense reports use the rate of the day they claim.

One click, with no JSON. Download currency.mcpb from the latest release and open it in Claude Desktop. It runs on the Node runtime Claude Desktop ships with, so your own PATH and node version never come into it.

Or a URL, with nothing installed. /mcp/connect mints a free anonymous token and prints the ready line:

claude mcp add --transport http currency https://mcp.zovo.one/mcp/currency/t/<token>

Or from a clone, for a client with no bundle installer. Build once, then point the client at the built file:

git clone https://github.com/theluckystrike/mcp-servers.git
cd mcp-servers && npm install
npm run build -w packages/mcp-license -w servers/currency

claude mcp add --scope user currency -- node /absolute/path/to/mcp-servers/servers/currency/dist/index.js

Claude Desktop, Cursor, Windsurf and Cline take the same two strings as JSON, in claude_desktop_config.json or the client's own MCP config file:

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "currency": {
      "command": "node",
      "args": ["/absolute/path/to/mcp-servers/servers/currency/dist/index.js"]
    }
  }
}

The npm packages are not published yet, so the npx form below returns a 404 today. It is kept because it is what that config becomes the day the publish lands, with nothing else changed; installing these servers when npx does not work yet has the whole picture.

claude mcp add currency -- npx -y @theluckystrike/mcp-currency

Why an invoice needs rate_on, not today's rate

Freelancers billing across borders get burned by rate drift: you quote on Monday, the client pays Friday, and the settlement amount differs. Asking the server for the rate on the invoice date gives you a defensible number to put on the document - the same logic accountants apply with month-end closing rates. The general currency guide covers the full workflow; the comparison page shows how this server stacks up against the alternatives.

The server runs locally over stdio with a disk cache, so repeated conversions in one session do not re-download the rate file. Free tier covers the core conversions; Pro is a one-time payment per server or part of the bundle.

Questions

Does it support USD to GHS, ZAR and KES?

Yes - every currency the ECB publishes daily reference rates for, roughly 30 including GHS, ZAR, KES and NGN. Any pair between them converts in one call.

How current are the rates?

They are the ECB's daily euro foreign-exchange reference rates, updated each business day. Weekends resolve to the last published day.

Can I get the rate for a past date?

Yes. rate_on returns the published rate for a given date, which is what back-dated invoices and expense reports should use.

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Servers used in this guide: MCP Currency Converter