Instagram DMs MCP

A Model Context Protocol (MCP) server that lets AI assistants read and send Instagram DMs.

Features

• 📥 Get Inbox - List all DM conversations with previews

• 💬 Read Messages - Get full message history from any thread

• ✉️ Send Messages - Send text messages to existing threads

• 🆕 Start Conversations - DM any user by username

• ❤️ React to Messages - Add emoji reactions

• 👤 User Lookup - Search for users by username

Quick Start

1. Get Your Instagram Cookies

Go to instagram.com and log in, then:

1. Open DevTools (F12 or Cmd+Option+I)

2. Go to Application tab → Cookies → https://www.instagram.com

3. Find and copy these cookie values:

4. Paste into console to generate JSON (replace with YOUR values):

This copies the JSON to your clipboard.

Why manual? Instagram marks sessionid as HttpOnly, so JavaScript can't read it directly. You need to copy it from the Application tab.

2. Save Your Cookies

Create the config directory and save your cookies:

Your cookies.json should look like:

3. Build & Run

The MCP server will be available at http://localhost:8000/mcp

Connecting to Poke

1. Go to poke.com/settings/connections

2. Add a new MCP integration

3. Enter your MCP server URL: http://your-server:8000/mcp

Available Tools

Example Usage

Once connected to Poke, you can ask things like:

• "Check my Instagram DMs"

• "What are my recent Instagram messages?"

• "Send a message to @username saying hello"

• "React to that last message with ❤️"

Architecture

• MCP Server (Python/FastMCP): Handles the MCP protocol and exposes tools

• IG Gateway (Go/messagix): Handles Instagram's web API using session cookies

Development

Running Components Separately

Gateway only:

MCP Server only:

Environment Variables

Deployment

Using Render

1. Fork this repository

2. Create a new web service on Render

3. Connect your forked repository

4. Set the environment variables:

   • IG_COOKIES_FILE: Path to your cookies (you'll need to handle this securely)

5. Deploy

Note: For production deployments, you'll need to run the Go gateway separately or include it in your build process.

Troubleshooting

"Could not connect to gateway"

• Make sure the gateway is running: ./gateway/ig-gateway

• Check that port 29391 is available

"No cookies file found"

• Create ~/.instagram-dms-mcp/cookies.json with your Instagram cookies

• Or set the IG_COOKIES_FILE environment variable

"Gateway failed to start"

• Check if your cookies are valid (try logging into Instagram web again)

• Instagram session cookies expire periodically - you may need to refresh them

Session expired

If your session expires, simply:

1. Log into Instagram web again

2. Run the cookie extraction script

3. Update your cookies.json

4. Restart the gateway

Security Notes

⚠️ Important: Your cookies.json contains your Instagram session. Keep it secure:

• Never commit it to version control

• Don't share it with anyone

• Consider the security implications of self-hosting

Credits

This project uses:

• FastMCP - Python MCP framework

• messagix - Instagram web client library (from mautrix-meta)

License

MIT