ytmusic-mcp

An MCP server that wraps ytmusicapi so Claude (or any MCP client) can search YouTube Music, manage your playlists, and read your listening history.

Tools

Not included (v1): BPM-based recommendations. YouTube Music doesn't expose tempo data, so this would need a second data source (e.g. an audio analysis API) — a stretch goal for a future version, not part of this build.

Related MCP server: mcp-server-youtube

Setup

1. Install dependencies

python3 -m venv .venv
source .venv/bin/activate
pip install -e .

2. Authenticate

There's no official YouTube Music API, so ytmusicapi authenticates by reusing headers from your logged-in browser session.

1. Open music.youtube.com in Firefox (recommended — its raw-header copy is more reliable than Chrome's) while logged in.

2. Open DevTools (Cmd+Option+I / F12) → Network tab → filter by browse.

3. Click into a playlist, or reload the page, to trigger a browse POST request.

4. Click that request → Headers tab → toggle Raw headers → select and copy the whole block.

5. Paste it into a new file named raw_headers.txt in the project root and save.

6. Run:

   python scripts/setup_auth_from_file.py

   This writes headers_auth.json and deletes raw_headers.txt.

Alternatively, python scripts/setup_auth.py does the same thing via an interactive terminal prompt instead of a file, if you prefer to paste directly.

headers_auth.json is equivalent to your logged-in session — never commit it or share it. It's already gitignored.

Verify auth works before going further:

python scripts/test_search.py

These headers expire/rotate periodically. If tools start failing with an auth error, redo this step.

3. Add to Claude Code

claude mcp add ytmusic -s user \
  -e YTMUSIC_AUTH_PATH="$(pwd)/headers_auth.json" \
  -- "$(pwd)/.venv/bin/python" "$(pwd)/server.py"

-s user makes it available in any Claude Code session, not just this directory. Use absolute paths for the python interpreter, server.py, and YTMUSIC_AUTH_PATH since the server can be launched from any working directory.

For other MCP clients (Claude Desktop, etc.), point them at the same command and env var using their respective config format.

Error handling

Tool calls translate common failure modes into clear messages instead of raw tracebacks:

• Missing/expired/malformed auth → tells you to rerun scripts/setup_auth_from_file.py.

• Rate limiting (HTTP 429) → tells you to wait and retry.

• Gated/restricted content → reported as unavailable rather than crashing.

• Network errors → reported directly.

License

MIT — see LICENSE.