Writing
Technology25 January 20263 min read

MCPs Are Quietly Replacing Postman and curl

By Kevin Bai

MCPs are quietly replacing Postman and curl—and most people haven't noticed yet.

For me, this is already true.

Any system with an API I expect to interact with more than once, my default move is to build an MCP around it. Not a script. Not a collection. An MCP.

Once it exists, I can query records, perform simple CRUD operations, explore edge cases, and debug state with minimal prompting and zero bespoke scripting. That workflow makes tools like Postman and curl feel increasingly obsolete. They assume the human is the execution engine. MCPs assume the human provides intent—and the system handles the rest.

This isn't traditional competition. Agentic tools just gave users a shorter path to what they actually want.

The Bypass, Not the Battle

That's why this shift will look less like disruption and more like abandonment.

Chegg and Stack Overflow weren't defeated by better competitors. They were bypassed by users who found easier paths to outcomes. The same dynamic is starting to play out here.

The Path Forward

This doesn't mean Postman is dead. Stack Overflow found a very real future in a post-agentic world, and there's a strong chance Postman can too.

But that path isn't guaranteed—and it's theirs to choose.

Users won't revolt. They'll just stop opening the app.

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