Atlan Data Catalog MCP server for AI agents

The Atlan Model Context Protocol (MCP) server enables AI agents to interact with Atlan's data catalog and governance services, providing AI access to your organization's data assets, lineage, and metadata through a standardized protocol.

Installation Options

You can install the Atlan MCP server using either Docker (recommended) or uv package manager.

Prerequisites

Before installation, you'll need:

An Atlan API key - generate one by following the API authentication documentation
Your Atlan instance URL
Optional: Your Atlan agent ID

Docker Installation

Prerequisites

Install Docker by following the official Docker installation guide
Verify Docker is running:
```
docker --version
```

Configure in Claude Desktop

Go to Claude > Settings > Developer > Edit Config > claude_desktop_config.json and add:

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "atlan": {
      "command": "docker",
      "args": [
        "run",
        "-i",
        "--rm",
        "-e",
        "ATLAN_API_KEY=<YOUR_API_KEY>",
        "-e",
        "ATLAN_BASE_URL=https://<YOUR_INSTANCE>.atlan.com",
        "-e",
        "ATLAN_AGENT_ID=<YOUR_AGENT_ID>",
        "ghcr.io/atlanhq/atlan-mcp-server:latest"
      ]
    }
  }
}

Configure in Cursor

Open Cursor > Settings > Tools & Integrations > New MCP Server and add:

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "atlan": {
      "command": "docker",
      "args": [
        "run",
        "-i",
        "--rm",
        "-e",
        "ATLAN_API_KEY=<YOUR_API_KEY>",
        "-e",
        "ATLAN_BASE_URL=https://<YOUR_INSTANCE>.atlan.com",
        "-e",
        "ATLAN_AGENT_ID=<YOUR_AGENT_ID>",
        "ghcr.io/atlanhq/atlan-mcp-server:latest"
      ]
    }
  }
}

UV Installation

Prerequisites

Install uv:

# macOS/Linux
curl -LsSf https://astral.sh/uv/install.sh | sh

# Windows (PowerShell)
powershell -c "irm https://astral.sh/uv/install.ps1 | iex"

# Alternative: if you already have Python/pip
pip install uv

Verify installation:
```
uv --version
```

Configure in Claude Desktop

Go to Claude > Settings > Developer > Edit Config > claude_desktop_config.json and add:

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "atlan": {
      "command": "uvx",
      "args": ["atlan-mcp-server"],
      "env": {
        "ATLAN_API_KEY": "<YOUR_API_KEY>",
        "ATLAN_BASE_URL": "https://<YOUR_INSTANCE>.atlan.com",
        "ATLAN_AGENT_ID": "<YOUR_AGENT_ID>"
      }
    }
  }
}

Configure in Cursor

Open Cursor > Settings > Tools & Integrations > New MCP Server and add:

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "atlan": {
      "command": "uvx",
      "args": ["atlan-mcp-server"],
      "env": {
        "ATLAN_API_KEY": "<YOUR_API_KEY>",
        "ATLAN_BASE_URL": "https://<YOUR_INSTANCE>.atlan.com",
        "ATLAN_AGENT_ID": "<YOUR_AGENT_ID>"
      }
    }
  }
}

Available Tools

The Atlan MCP server provides the following tools:

Tool	Description
`search_assets`	Search for assets based on conditions
`get_assets_by_dsl`	Retrieve assets using a DSL query
`traverse_lineage`	Retrieve lineage for an asset
`update_assets`	Update asset attributes (descriptions and certificates)
`create_glossaries`	Create glossaries
`create_glossary_categories`	Create glossary categories
`create_glossary_terms`	Create glossary terms
`query_asset`	Execute SQL queries on table/view assets

Access Control Configuration

You can restrict which tools are available to users by configuring the RESTRICTED_TOOLS environment variable.

Restricting Tools with Docker

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "atlan": {
      "command": "docker",
      "args": [
        "run",
        "-i",
        "--rm",
        "-e",
        "ATLAN_API_KEY=<YOUR_API_KEY>",
        "-e",
        "ATLAN_BASE_URL=https://<YOUR_INSTANCE>.atlan.com",
        "-e",
        "ATLAN_AGENT_ID=<YOUR_AGENT_ID>",
        "-e",
        "RESTRICTED_TOOLS=get_assets_by_dsl_tool,update_assets_tool",
        "ghcr.io/atlanhq/atlan-mcp-server:latest"
      ]
    }
  }
}

Restricting Tools with UV

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "atlan": {
      "command": "uvx",
      "args": ["atlan-mcp-server"],
      "env": {
        "ATLAN_API_KEY": "<YOUR_API_KEY>",
        "ATLAN_BASE_URL": "https://<YOUR_INSTANCE>.atlan.com",
        "ATLAN_AGENT_ID": "<YOUR_AGENT_ID>",
        "RESTRICTED_TOOLS": "get_assets_by_dsl_tool,update_assets_tool"
      }
    }
  }
}

Common Access Control Configurations

Read-Only Access

RESTRICTED_TOOLS=update_assets_tool,create_glossaries,create_glossary_categories,create_glossary_terms

Disable DSL Queries

RESTRICTED_TOOLS=get_assets_by_dsl_tool

Minimal Access (Search Only)

RESTRICTED_TOOLS=get_assets_by_dsl_tool,update_assets_tool,traverse_lineage_tool,create_glossaries,create_glossary_categories,create_glossary_terms

Transport Modes

The server supports three transport modes for different deployment scenarios:

Transport Mode	Use Case	When to Use
stdio (Default)	Local development, IDE integrations	Claude Desktop, Cursor IDE
SSE (Server-Sent Events)	Remote deployments, web browsers	Cloud deployments, web clients
streamable-http	HTTP-based remote connections	Kubernetes, containerized deployments

Production Deployment

For production deployment:

Host the Atlan MCP container on your preferred cloud platform
Include all required environment variables
Use SSE Transport mode (-e MCP_TRANSPORT=sse) for production environments

Troubleshooting

If Claude Desktop shows an error like spawn uv ENOENT, it cannot find the uv executable:

Verify uv is installed and in your PATH
Run which uv to check the installation path
Update Claude's configuration with the exact uv path from whereis uv

How to install this MCP server

For Claude Code

To add this MCP server to Claude Code, run this command in your terminal:

claude mcp add-json "Atlan-MCP" '{"command":"uv","args":["run","/path/to/your/agent-toolkit/modelcontextprotocol/.venv/bin/atlan-mcp-server"],"env":{"ATLAN_API_KEY":"your_api_key","ATLAN_BASE_URL":"https://your-instance.atlan.com","ATLAN_AGENT_ID":"your_agent_id"}}'

See the official Claude Code MCP documentation for more details.

For Cursor

There are two ways to add an MCP server to Cursor. The most common way is to add the server globally in the ~/.cursor/mcp.json file so that it is available in all of your projects.

If you only need the server in a single project, you can add it to the project instead by creating or adding it to the .cursor/mcp.json file.

Adding an MCP server to Cursor globally

To add a global MCP server go to Cursor Settings > Tools & Integrations and click "New MCP Server".

When you click that button the ~/.cursor/mcp.json file will be opened and you can add your server like this:

{
    "mcpServers": {
        "Atlan MCP": {
            "command": "uv",
            "args": [
                "run",
                "/path/to/your/agent-toolkit/modelcontextprotocol/.venv/bin/atlan-mcp-server"
            ],
            "env": {
                "ATLAN_API_KEY": "your_api_key",
                "ATLAN_BASE_URL": "https://your-instance.atlan.com",
                "ATLAN_AGENT_ID": "your_agent_id"
            }
        }
    }
}

Adding an MCP server to a project

To add an MCP server to a project you can create a new .cursor/mcp.json file or add it to the existing one. This will look exactly the same as the global MCP server example above.

How to use the MCP server

Once the server is installed, you might need to head back to Settings > MCP and click the refresh button.

The Cursor agent will then be able to see the available tools the added MCP server has available and will call them when it needs to.

You can also explicitly ask the agent to use the tool by mentioning the tool name and describing what the function does.

For Claude Desktop

To add this MCP server to Claude Desktop:

1. Find your configuration file:

macOS: ~/Library/Application Support/Claude/claude_desktop_config.json
Windows: %APPDATA%\Claude\claude_desktop_config.json
Linux: ~/.config/Claude/claude_desktop_config.json

2. Add this to your configuration file:

{
    "mcpServers": {
        "Atlan MCP": {
            "command": "uv",
            "args": [
                "run",
                "/path/to/your/agent-toolkit/modelcontextprotocol/.venv/bin/atlan-mcp-server"
            ],
            "env": {
                "ATLAN_API_KEY": "your_api_key",
                "ATLAN_BASE_URL": "https://your-instance.atlan.com",
                "ATLAN_AGENT_ID": "your_agent_id"
            }
        }
    }
}

3. Restart Claude Desktop for the changes to take effect