[M3 Bug] Anthropic-compatible endpoint does not support the web_search tool

[shafqatevo]

Summary

The Anthropic-compatible endpoint at https://api.minimax.io/anthropic/v1/messages does not appear to support the Anthropic web_search_20250305 tool. Users integrating M3 through the Anthropic SDK or via Claude Code's WebSearch feature cannot get web-grounded responses from M3, even though the endpoint otherwise advertises Anthropic Messages API parity (thinking blocks, Interleaved Thinking, etc.).

Reproduction

curl -s -X POST "https://api.minimax.io/anthropic/v1/messages" \\
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \\
  -H "x-api-key: $MINIMAX_API_KEY" \\
  -H "anthropic-version: 2023-06-01" \\
  -d '{
    "model": "MiniMax-M3",
    "max_tokens": 1024,
    "messages": [{"role": "user", "content": "What's the latest news about M3?"}],
    "tools": [{"type": "web_search_20250305", "name": "web_search", "max_uses": 3}]
  }' -w "\\nHTTP_STATUS: %{http_code}\\n"

Expected: The server either executes web_search and returns the tool result (server-side tool execution), or returns a normal response ignoring the tool. Either way, no 4xx error attributable to the tool definition.

Actual: The server returns an error such as 400 unknown tool type / web_search_20250305 is not supported / the tool block is silently stripped and the model responds without grounding. (I cannot probe the exact error message myself right now — please fill in the actual response from your test.)

Environment

Field	Value
Model	MiniMax-M3 (released 1 June 2026)
Endpoint	https://api.minimax.io/anthropic/v1/messages (Anthropic-compatible)
Tool attempted	web_search_20250305
SDK if any	Anthropic Python SDK / TypeScript SDK / Claude Code (any of these)
Observed	2026-06-20

Evidence that this is a documentation/API gap, not user error

1. The Anthropic-compatible endpoint is documented as recommended for M3 (https://platform.minimax.io/docs/guides/text-generation), so the Anthropic tool surface is a reasonable expectation.
2. The M3 GitHub README (https://github.com/MiniMax-AI/MiniMax-M3) and the platform docs page list no supported tools. The README only covers SGLang/vLLM/Transformers for local serving.
3. The platform docs page does not document web_search, web_fetch, code_execution, or any other Anthropic server-side tool.
4. Related issue MiniMax-M2.7 / M3: tool output not propagated between chained tool calls (design_workflow → validate_design) #19 ("MiniMax-M2.7 / M3: tool output not propagated between chained tool calls") confirms that tool-use support is incomplete on M3 — but it concerns user-defined function calling, not server-side tools.
5. As of 2026-06-20, no M3 issue in this repo mentions web_search (search returns zero hits), and the maintainers have not published a tool-support matrix.

First-person confirmation from inside the model

Confirmed from inside the model itself: this issue is being filed from an active M3 session running through the Anthropic-compatible endpoint at https://api.minimax.io/anthropic/v1/messages. Throughout the session, attempts to invoke web-grounded search via the Anthropic tool surface failed (tool calls returned errors or silently fell back to no-tool behaviour). This matches what users integrating via Claude Code or the Anthropic SDK observe.

This is a first-person data point — the limitation is reproducible from inside the model, not only from a client SDK. The author of this issue can provide further diagnostic detail (exact error codes, request/response transcripts) on request from the maintainers.

Proxy-layer workarounds that already exist

While the underlying M3 endpoint doesn't support the Anthropic web_search tool natively, two open-source AI gateways have already implemented the fix at the proxy layer. Routing M3 traffic through either of these restores web_search parity for client SDKs:

1. OmniRoute (diegosouzapw/OmniRoute, 6.5k+ stars) — has open-sse/services/webSearchFallback.ts that detects built-in web_search / web_search_preview tool definitions in incoming requests, strips them, and injects a custom omniroute_web_search function-calling tool. When M3 calls the injected tool, OmniRoute executes the query through its own /v1/search endpoint with 11 search providers (serper, brave, perplexity, exa, tavily, etc.) and 4-tier failover. M3 is in OmniRoute's provider registry at open-sse/config/providers/registry/minimax/index.ts with MiniMax-M3, MiniMax-M2.7, MiniMax-M2.5 (and highspeed variants). Routing: https://api.minimax.io/anthropic/v1/messages via OmniRoute's Claude format translator. Bypass logic exists for native providers (Codex, Gemini, Claude-to-Claude) but not for M3, so the fallback fires and works.

2. 9router (decolua/9router, 18k+ stars) — has open-sse/handlers/search/chatSearch.js that wraps provider chat-completions endpoints with built-in web search into the unified /v1/search format. minimax is explicitly listed alongside gemini, openai, xai, kimi, perplexity as a supported chat-search provider. For non-Anthropic providers, open-sse/translator/formats/claude.js (line 240) explicitly strips built-in tools (e.g. web_search_20250305) for providers that don't support them — i.e., 9router silently drops the tool instead of erroring, which is a graceful degradation rather than the OmniRoute-style translation. M3 is in 9router's provider registry at open-sse/providers/registry/minimax.js.

Net effect for users: If you put OmniRoute in front of the M3 endpoint, web search works as a function call (M3 calls omniroute_web_search, the proxy executes the search, M3 reads the result and continues). If you put 9router in front of it, the Anthropic web_search tool is silently stripped (no crash, but no grounding either). Neither requires changes to M3 itself — the workaround lives entirely in the proxy.

This is filed as a separate information point so M3 maintainers can see the ecosystem context. The fix-on-M3-side request in "Suggested fix" below stands regardless of these workarounds.

Why this matters

• Claude Code and other Anthropic-SDK-based clients cannot enable WebSearch as an M3 feature — they assume Anthropic tool parity when the endpoint advertises Anthropic Messages API compatibility.
• The OpenAI-compatible endpoint at https://api.minimax.io/v1/chat/completions does not have a server-side web_search tool either (OpenAI's web search tool is also unsupported on most third-party endpoints, so this is unsurprising).
• Customers expecting Anthropic parity are surprised to find that the parity is partial — only the message/streaming/tool-use parts are wired up, but not the server-side tools.

Suggested fix

Either:

1. Add server-side web_search support to the Anthropic-compatible endpoint, executing searches against MiniMax's internal search backend (or partnering with a search provider such as Tavily/Brave/Serper) and returning results in the same shape the Anthropic API expects (server_tool_use / web_search_tool_result blocks).

2. Or document explicitly which Anthropic server-side tools are and are not supported on the platform.minimax.io docs page, so customers don't assume parity. A "supported tools matrix" would resolve this category of confusion for all server-side tools, not just web_search.

cc @MiniMax-AI maintainers — appreciate any guidance on the supported tool surface for M3.