The Paperless-NGX MCP Server enables interaction with a Paperless-NGX API server to manage documents and related entities:
Manage Documents: List, create, update, delete, search, and download documents. Perform bulk operations including setting metadata, merging, splitting, rotating, and deleting pages.
Manage Tags: List, create, update, delete, and bulk edit tags, including setting permissions.
Manage Correspondents: List, create, and bulk edit correspondents, including permission settings.
Manage Document Types: List, create, and bulk edit document types with permission controls.
Advanced Features: Upload documents with custom fields and archive serial numbers.
Provides tools for managing documents, tags, correspondents, and document types in a Paperless-NGX instance, including document operations (listing, searching, downloading, uploading), tag operations, correspondent operations, and document type operations
Paperless-NGX MCP Server
An MCP (Model Context Protocol) server for interacting with a Paperless-NGX API server. This server provides tools for managing documents, tags, correspondents, and document types in your Paperless-NGX instance.
Quick Start
Installing via Smithery
To install Paperless NGX MCP Server for Claude Desktop automatically via Smithery:
Manual Installation
- Install the MCP server:
- Add it to your Claude's MCP configuration:
For VSCode extension, edit ~/Library/Application Support/Code/User/globalStorage/saoudrizwan.claude-dev/settings/cline_mcp_settings.json
:
For Claude desktop app, edit ~/Library/Application Support/Claude/claude_desktop_config.json
:
- Get your API token:
- Log into your Paperless-NGX instance
- Click your username in the top right
- Select "My Profile"
- Click the circular arrow button to generate a new token
- Replace the placeholders in your MCP config:
http://your-paperless-instance:8000
with your Paperless-NGX URLyour-api-token
with the token you just generated
That's it! Now you can ask Claude to help you manage your Paperless-NGX documents.
Example Usage
Here are some things you can ask Claude to do:
- "Show me all documents tagged as 'Invoice'"
- "Search for documents containing 'tax return'"
- "Create a new tag called 'Receipts' with color #FF0000"
- "Download document #123"
- "List all correspondents"
- "Create a new document type called 'Bank Statement'"
Available Tools
Document Operations
list_documents
Get a paginated list of all documents.
Parameters:
- page (optional): Page number
- page_size (optional): Number of documents per page
get_document
Get a specific document by ID.
Parameters:
- id: Document ID
search_documents
Full-text search across documents.
Parameters:
- query: Search query string
download_document
Download a document file by ID.
Parameters:
- id: Document ID
- original (optional): If true, downloads original file instead of archived version
bulk_edit_documents
Perform bulk operations on multiple documents.
Parameters:
- documents: Array of document IDs
- method: One of:
- set_correspondent: Set correspondent for documents
- set_document_type: Set document type for documents
- set_storage_path: Set storage path for documents
- add_tag: Add a tag to documents
- remove_tag: Remove a tag from documents
- modify_tags: Add and/or remove multiple tags
- delete: Delete documents
- reprocess: Reprocess documents
- set_permissions: Set document permissions
- merge: Merge multiple documents
- split: Split a document into multiple documents
- rotate: Rotate document pages
- delete_pages: Delete specific pages from a document
- Additional parameters based on method:
- correspondent: ID for set_correspondent
- document_type: ID for set_document_type
- storage_path: ID for set_storage_path
- tag: ID for add_tag/remove_tag
- add_tags: Array of tag IDs for modify_tags
- remove_tags: Array of tag IDs for modify_tags
- permissions: Object for set_permissions with owner, permissions, merge flag
- metadata_document_id: ID for merge to specify metadata source
- delete_originals: Boolean for merge/split
- pages: String for split "[1,2-3,4,5-7]" or delete_pages "[2,3,4]"
- degrees: Number for rotate (90, 180, or 270)
Examples:
post_document
Upload a new document to Paperless-NGX.
Parameters:
- file: Base64 encoded file content
- filename: Name of the file
- title (optional): Title for the document
- created (optional): DateTime when the document was created (e.g. "2024-01-19" or "2024-01-19 06:15:00+02:00")
- correspondent (optional): ID of a correspondent
- document_type (optional): ID of a document type
- storage_path (optional): ID of a storage path
- tags (optional): Array of tag IDs
- archive_serial_number (optional): Archive serial number
- custom_fields (optional): Array of custom field IDs
Tag Operations
list_tags
Get all tags.
create_tag
Create a new tag.
Parameters:
- name: Tag name
- color (optional): Hex color code (e.g. "#ff0000")
- match (optional): Text pattern to match
- matching_algorithm (optional): One of "any", "all", "exact", "regular expression", "fuzzy"
Correspondent Operations
list_correspondents
Get all correspondents.
create_correspondent
Create a new correspondent.
Parameters:
- name: Correspondent name
- match (optional): Text pattern to match
- matching_algorithm (optional): One of "any", "all", "exact", "regular expression", "fuzzy"
Document Type Operations
list_document_types
Get all document types.
create_document_type
Create a new document type.
Parameters:
- name: Document type name
- match (optional): Text pattern to match
- matching_algorithm (optional): One of "any", "all", "exact", "regular expression", "fuzzy"
Error Handling
The server will show clear error messages if:
- The Paperless-NGX URL or API token is incorrect
- The Paperless-NGX server is unreachable
- The requested operation fails
- The provided parameters are invalid
Development
Want to contribute or modify the server? Here's what you need to know:
- Clone the repository
- Install dependencies:
- Make your changes to server.js
- Test locally:
The server is built with:
API Documentation
This MCP server implements endpoints from the Paperless-NGX REST API. For more details about the underlying API, see the official documentation.
Running the MCP Server
The MCP server can be run in two modes:
1. stdio (default)
This is the default mode. The server communicates over stdio, suitable for CLI and direct integrations.
2. HTTP (Streamable HTTP Transport)
To run the server as an HTTP service, use the --http
flag. You can also specify the port with --port
(default: 3000). This mode requires Express to be installed (it is included as a dependency).
- The MCP API will be available at
POST /mcp
on the specified port. - Each request is handled statelessly, following the StreamableHTTPServerTransport pattern.
- GET and DELETE requests to
/mcp
will return 405 Method Not Allowed.
remote-capable server
The server can be hosted and run remotely because it primarily relies on remote services or has no dependency on the local environment.
Tools
Enables interaction with Paperless-NGX API servers, supporting document management, tagging, and metadata operations through a natural language interface.
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