Best Alternatives to The Brains in 2025
The Brains is a niche tool that packages the public thinking of notable founders, CEOs, and investors into searchable MCP servers, so you can query how Pieter Levels prices or what Paul Graham says about fundraising directly inside Claude, Cursor, ChatGPT, or Codex, with every answer cited back to its source. It currently offers 37 brains built from talks, essays, interviews, and posts. If you want broader knowledge coverage, different expert rosters, or a more general research workflow, these alternatives are worth evaluating.
Perplexity
Where Knowledge Begins
A general AI answer engine that cites sources for every response. It covers far more than founder wisdom, so it is better when you need cited research across the web rather than a curated set of founder and investor perspectives.
Glasp
Lets you build a personal knowledge base from articles, videos, and posts, then query it with AI. It is a strong fit if you want to assemble your own 'brains' from specific thinkers rather than rely on a fixed roster of 37.
Readwise Reader with Ghostreader
Captures highlights from books, essays, and interviews and lets you query them with AI. Useful for people who want cited answers grounded in their own reading of founder and investor content.
Mem.ai
An AI-native notes and knowledge tool that surfaces relevant material from your own saved content. Good for teams that want a searchable internal brain rather than a public MCP server of notable figures.
ChatGPT with custom GPTs and browsing
You can build custom GPTs loaded with essays, transcripts, and posts from specific founders, and use browsing for citations. More flexible and general-purpose, though it requires setup and does not ship with a ready-made expert roster.
Claude Projects with MCP connectors
Since The Brains runs as MCP servers, Claude Projects with your own MCP connectors or uploaded source documents can replicate the workflow. Better if you want full control over which sources and experts are included.
Exa
A search API tuned for AI applications that can retrieve and cite high-quality sources, including interviews and essays. Suited to developers who want to build their own cited expert-search product rather than use a prebuilt one.
The Brains stands out for its curated, citation-first MCP servers built from 37 notable founders and investors, making it ideal for quick, sourced answers inside Claude, Cursor, ChatGPT, or Codex. Perplexity and Exa are better for broad, cited web research; Glasp, Readwise Reader, and Mem.ai suit people who want to build and query their own knowledge base; and ChatGPT custom GPTs or Claude Projects with MCP connectors offer the most control if you are willing to assemble sources yourself. Choose The Brains if the fixed expert roster and ready-made MCP integration match your needs, and pick an alternative if you need wider coverage, custom experts, or a personal research workflow.