How to integrate Perplexityai MCP with Autogen

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Perplexityai delivers natural, conversational AI models for generating human-like text. Instantly get context-aware, high-quality responses for chat, search, or complex workflows.

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Introduction

This guide walks you through connecting Perplexityai to AutoGen using the Composio tool router. By the end, you'll have a working Perplexityai agent that can run chat completions, search the web, create embeddings, execute agents, and check your usage analytics through natural language commands.

This guide will help you understand how to give your AutoGen agent real control over a Perplexityai account through Composio's Perplexityai MCP server.

Before we dive in, let's take a quick look at the key ideas and tools involved.

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TL;DR

Here's what you'll learn:
  • Get and set up your OpenAI and Composio API keys
  • Install the required dependencies for Autogen and Composio
  • Initialize Composio and create a Tool Router session for Perplexityai
  • Wire that MCP URL into Autogen using McpWorkbench and StreamableHttpServerParams
  • Configure an Autogen AssistantAgent that can call Perplexityai tools
  • Run a live chat loop where you ask the agent to perform Perplexityai operations

What is AutoGen?

Autogen is a framework for building multi-agent conversational AI systems from Microsoft. It enables you to create agents that can collaborate, use tools, and maintain complex workflows.

Key features include:

  • Multi-Agent Systems: Build collaborative agent workflows
  • MCP Workbench: Native support for Model Context Protocol tools
  • Streaming HTTP: Connect to external services through streamable HTTP
  • AssistantAgent: Pre-built agent class for tool-using assistants

What is the Perplexityai MCP server, and what's possible with it?

The Perplexity AI MCP server is an implementation of the Model Context Protocol that connects your AI agent and assistants like Claude, Cursor, etc directly to your Perplexity AI account. It provides structured and secure access to Perplexity AI's conversational models, web search, embeddings, and agent execution, so your agent can search the web, generate responses, run Perplexity agents, create embeddings, and manage asynchronous chat requests on your behalf.

  • Web search: Have your agent search the web and return relevant results for research, fact-finding, or current topics.
  • Conversational responses: Let the agent use Perplexity Sonar models to answer questions, explain topics, and generate human-like text.
  • Asynchronous chat tasks: Direct your agent to start longer chat requests, check their progress, and review previously submitted requests.
  • Perplexity agent execution: Instruct your agent to run a Perplexity agent for tasks that need an agent-generated response.
  • Text embeddings and model discovery: Have your agent create standard or contextualized embeddings for text and view the Perplexity models available to your account.

What is the Composio tool router, and how does it fit here?

What is Composio SDK?

Composio's Composio SDK helps agents find the right tools for a task at runtime. You can plug in multiple toolkits (like Gmail, HubSpot, and GitHub), and the agent will identify the relevant app and action to complete multi-step workflows. This can reduce token usage and improve the reliability of tool calls. Read more here: Getting started with Composio SDK

The tool router generates a secure MCP URL that your agents can access to perform actions.

How the Composio SDK works

The Composio SDK follows a three-phase workflow:

  1. Discovery: Searches for tools matching your task and returns relevant toolkits with their details.
  2. Authentication: Checks for active connections. If missing, creates an auth config and returns a connection URL via Auth Link.
  3. Execution: Executes the action using the authenticated connection.

Step-by-step Guide

Step by step08 STEPS
1

Prerequisites

You will need:

  • A Composio API key
  • An OpenAI API key (used by Autogen's OpenAIChatCompletionClient)
  • A Perplexityai account you can connect to Composio
  • Some basic familiarity with Autogen and Python async
2

Getting API Keys for OpenAI and Composio

OpenAI API Key
  • Go to the OpenAI dashboard and create an API key. You'll need credits to use the models, or you can connect to another model provider.
  • Keep the API key safe.
Composio API Key
  • Log in to the Composio dashboard.
  • Navigate to your API settings and generate a new API key.
  • Store this key securely as you'll need it for authentication.
3

Install dependencies

bash
pip install composio python-dotenv
pip install autogen-agentchat autogen-ext-openai autogen-ext-tools

Install Composio, Autogen extensions, and dotenv.

What's happening:

  • composio connects your agent to Perplexityai via MCP
  • autogen-agentchat provides the AssistantAgent class
  • autogen-ext-openai provides the OpenAI model client
  • autogen-ext-tools provides MCP workbench support

4

Set up environment variables

bash
COMPOSIO_API_KEY=your-composio-api-key
OPENAI_API_KEY=your-openai-api-key
USER_ID=your-user-identifier@example.com

Create a .env file in your project folder.

What's happening:

  • COMPOSIO_API_KEY is required to talk to Composio
  • OPENAI_API_KEY is used by Autogen's OpenAI client
  • USER_ID is how Composio identifies which user's Perplexityai connections to use
5

Import dependencies and create Tool Router session

python
import asyncio
import os
from dotenv import load_dotenv
from composio import Composio

from autogen_agentchat.agents import AssistantAgent
from autogen_ext.models.openai import OpenAIChatCompletionClient
from autogen_ext.tools.mcp import McpWorkbench, StreamableHttpServerParams

load_dotenv()

async def main():
    # Initialize Composio and create a Perplexityai session
    composio = Composio(api_key=os.getenv("COMPOSIO_API_KEY"))
    session = composio.create(
        user_id=os.getenv("USER_ID"),
        toolkits=["perplexityai"]
    )
    url = session.mcp.url
What's happening:
  • load_dotenv() reads your .env file
  • Composio(api_key=...) initializes the SDK
  • create(...) creates a Tool Router session that exposes Perplexityai tools
  • session.mcp.url is the MCP endpoint that Autogen will connect to
6

Configure MCP parameters for Autogen

python
# Configure MCP server parameters for Streamable HTTP
server_params = StreamableHttpServerParams(
    url=url,
    timeout=30.0,
    sse_read_timeout=300.0,
    terminate_on_close=True,
    headers={"x-api-key": os.getenv("COMPOSIO_API_KEY")}
)

Autogen expects parameters describing how to talk to the MCP server. That is what StreamableHttpServerParams is for.

What's happening:

  • url points to the Tool Router MCP endpoint from Composio
  • timeout is the HTTP timeout for requests
  • sse_read_timeout controls how long to wait when streaming responses
  • terminate_on_close=True cleans up the MCP server process when the workbench is closed
7

Create the model client and agent

python
# Create model client
model_client = OpenAIChatCompletionClient(
    model="gpt-5",
    api_key=os.getenv("OPENAI_API_KEY")
)

# Use McpWorkbench as context manager
async with McpWorkbench(server_params) as workbench:
    # Create Perplexityai assistant agent with MCP tools
    agent = AssistantAgent(
        name="perplexityai_assistant",
        description="An AI assistant that helps with Perplexityai operations.",
        model_client=model_client,
        workbench=workbench,
        model_client_stream=True,
        max_tool_iterations=10
    )

What's happening:

  • OpenAIChatCompletionClient wraps the OpenAI model for Autogen
  • McpWorkbench connects the agent to the MCP tools
  • AssistantAgent is configured with the Perplexityai tools from the workbench
8

Run the interactive chat loop

python
print("Chat started! Type 'exit' or 'quit' to end the conversation.\n")
print("Ask any Perplexityai related question or task to the agent.\n")

# Conversation loop
while True:
    user_input = input("You: ").strip()

    if user_input.lower() in ["exit", "quit", "bye"]:
        print("\nGoodbye!")
        break

    if not user_input:
        continue

    print("\nAgent is thinking...\n")

    # Run the agent with streaming
    try:
        response_text = ""
        async for message in agent.run_stream(task=user_input):
            if hasattr(message, "content") and message.content:
                response_text = message.content

        # Print the final response
        if response_text:
            print(f"Agent: {response_text}\n")
        else:
            print("Agent: I encountered an issue processing your request.\n")

    except Exception as e:
        print(f"Agent: Sorry, I encountered an error: {str(e)}\n")
What's happening:
  • The script prompts you in a loop with You:
  • Autogen passes your input to the model, which decides which Perplexityai tools to call via MCP
  • agent.run_stream(...) yields streaming messages as the agent thinks and calls tools
  • Typing exit, quit, or bye ends the loop

Complete Code

Here's the complete code to get you started with Perplexityai and AutoGen:

python
import asyncio
import os
from dotenv import load_dotenv
from composio import Composio

from autogen_agentchat.agents import AssistantAgent
from autogen_ext.models.openai import OpenAIChatCompletionClient
from autogen_ext.tools.mcp import McpWorkbench, StreamableHttpServerParams

load_dotenv()

async def main():
    # Initialize Composio and create a Perplexityai session
    composio = Composio(api_key=os.getenv("COMPOSIO_API_KEY"))
    session = composio.create(
        user_id=os.getenv("USER_ID"),
        toolkits=["perplexityai"]
    )
    url = session.mcp.url

    # Configure MCP server parameters for Streamable HTTP
    server_params = StreamableHttpServerParams(
        url=url,
        timeout=30.0,
        sse_read_timeout=300.0,
        terminate_on_close=True,
        headers={"x-api-key": os.getenv("COMPOSIO_API_KEY")}
    )

    # Create model client
    model_client = OpenAIChatCompletionClient(
        model="gpt-5",
        api_key=os.getenv("OPENAI_API_KEY")
    )

    # Use McpWorkbench as context manager
    async with McpWorkbench(server_params) as workbench:
        # Create Perplexityai assistant agent with MCP tools
        agent = AssistantAgent(
            name="perplexityai_assistant",
            description="An AI assistant that helps with Perplexityai operations.",
            model_client=model_client,
            workbench=workbench,
            model_client_stream=True,
            max_tool_iterations=10
        )

        print("Chat started! Type 'exit' or 'quit' to end the conversation.\n")
        print("Ask any Perplexityai related question or task to the agent.\n")

        # Conversation loop
        while True:
            user_input = input("You: ").strip()

            if user_input.lower() in ['exit', 'quit', 'bye']:
                print("\nGoodbye!")
                break

            if not user_input:
                continue

            print("\nAgent is thinking...\n")

            # Run the agent with streaming
            try:
                response_text = ""
                async for message in agent.run_stream(task=user_input):
                    if hasattr(message, 'content') and message.content:
                        response_text = message.content

                # Print the final response
                if response_text:
                    print(f"Agent: {response_text}\n")
                else:
                    print("Agent: I encountered an issue processing your request.\n")

            except Exception as e:
                print(f"Agent: Sorry, I encountered an error: {str(e)}\n")

if __name__ == "__main__":
    asyncio.run(main())

Conclusion

You now have an Autogen assistant wired into Perplexityai through Composio's Tool Router and MCP. From here you can:
  • Add more toolkits to the toolkits list, for example notion or hubspot
  • Refine the agent description to point it at specific workflows
  • Wrap this script behind a UI, Slack bot, or internal tool
Once the pattern is clear for Perplexityai, you can reuse the same structure for other MCP-enabled apps with minimal code changes.
TOOLS

Supported Tools

Every Perplexityai action and event your agent gets out of the box.

Cancel Agent Response

Request cancellation of an existing durable agent response.

Create Async Chat Completion

Create Async Chat Completion (POST /v1/async/sonar).

Create Chat Completion

Generate a chat-compatible response from conversation messages, with optional search controls.

Create Contextualized Embeddings

Create Contextualized Embeddings (POST /v1/contextualizedembeddings).

CreateEmbeddings

Generate vector embeddings for independent texts (queries, sentences, documents).

Create Orchestrator Chat Completion

Create a non-streaming OpenAI-compatible chat completion using a cataloged Orchestrator model.

Create Orchestrator Message

Create a non-streaming Anthropic-compatible message using an Orchestrator catalog model.

CreateOrchestratorResponse

Generate a non-streaming model response through the Perplexity Orchestrator using a creator/model-name catalog ID, input text or structured items, optional tools, and structured output settings.

Create Skill

Create a Project-owned skill from a ZIP bundle containing SKILL.

Delete Skill

Delete a skill only if its current revision matches expected_revision.

Download Agent Response File

Download a file delivered by an Agent response's share_file tool.

Evaluate Decisions

Evaluate named yes/no, choice, and score questions against shared content.

Execute Agent

Create Agent Response (POST /v1/agent).

Get Agent Response

Retrieve a stored Agent response as a JSON snapshot (GET /v1/agent/{id}).

Get Async Chat Completion

Get Async Chat Completion (GET /v1/async/sonar/{id}).

Get Member Usage Analytics

Get organization Perplexity usage per member in daily UTC buckets.

Get Orchestrator Model

Retrieve one Orchestrator model by its full provider/model id.

Get Skill

Get a skill's metadata by identifier, optionally at a specific revision.

Get Skill Download URL

Get a short-lived URL to download a skill bundle as a ZIP, optionally for a specific revision; omit the revision to select the active revision.

Get Usage Analytics

Get an organization's Perplexity Computer usage as a bucketed time series.

List Agent Response Files

List files an agent response delivered from its sandbox using share_file.

List Async Chat Completions

List a page of legacy asynchronous Sonar chat completion requests for the authenticated user, including their statuses.

List Models

List Models (GET /v1/models).

List Orchestrator Models

List available Orchestrator API models sorted by id, with base token prices.

List Skill Revisions

List a skill's revisions, newest first.

List Skills

List skills in the authenticated Project, newest first.

Perplexity Search (Raw Results)

Search the Web (POST /search).

Update Skill

Upload a new ZIP bundle as a revision of an existing Project-owned skill.

FAQ

Frequently asked questions

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