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time vs photon

Side-by-side comparison to help you pick between these two MCP servers.

time
by modelcontextprotocol
photon
by portel-dev
Stars★ 85,748★ 94
30d uses
Score7747
Official
Categories
ProductivityDeveloper ToolsCommunication
Developer ToolsAI / LLM ToolsProductivity
LanguageTypeScriptTypeScript
Last committhis monththis month

time · Summary

A comprehensive MCP server providing time and timezone conversion tools with automatic system timezone detection.

photon · Summary

Photon turns TypeScript files into MCP servers, CLI tools, and web interfaces with minimal boilerplate.

time · Use cases

  • Assisting with international meeting scheduling across time zones
  • Providing real-time time information for location-based queries
  • Enabling time conversion for travel planning and itineraries

photon · Use cases

  • Building AI-accessible tools without MCP server expertise
  • Creating multi-interface tools with a single codebase
  • Rapid prototyping of functionality for both humans and AI

time · Install

Installation Options

**Using uv (recommended):**

uvx mcp-server-time

**Using PIP:**

pip install mcp-server-time
python -m mcp_server_time

**Configure for Claude Desktop:**

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "time": {
      "command": "uvx",
      "args": ["mcp-server-time"]
    }
  }
}

photon · Install

Install Photon globally:

bun add -g @portel/photon

Create a new photon:

photon new my-tool

Install as MCP server for Claude Desktop:

photon mcp install my-tool

Add to Claude Desktop config:

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "my-tool": {
      "command": "photon",
      "args": ["mcp", "my-tool"]
    }
  }
}
Comparison generated from public README + GitHub signals. Last updated automatically.