Atlan Data Catalog MCP server for AI agents

The Atlan Model Context Protocol (MCP) server enables AI agents to interact with Atlan data catalog services, providing seamless access to your data assets through a standardized protocol interface.

Installation Options

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

Docker Installation

Prerequisites:

Docker installed on your system (follow 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 to include:

{
  "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 to include:

{
  "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 to include:

{
  "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>"
      }
    }
  }
}

Using the MCP Server

The Atlan MCP server provides the following tools for interacting with your Atlan instance:

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 (user description and certificate status)
`create_glossaries`	Create glossaries
`create_glossary_categories`	Create glossary categories
`create_glossary_terms`	Create glossary terms

Production Deployment

To deploy the MCP server in production:

Host the Atlan MCP container image on your preferred cloud/platform
Add all required environment variables
Start the server in SSE transport mode: -e MCP_TRANSPORT=sse

Connecting to Remote MCP Server

You can use the mcp-remote local proxy tool to connect to a remote MCP server:

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "math": {
      "command": "npx",
      "args": ["mcp-remote", "https://hosted-domain"]
    }
  }
}

Troubleshooting

If Claude Desktop shows an error like spawn uv ENOENT {"context":"connection","stack":"Error: spawn uv ENOENT\n at ChildProcess._handle.onexit:

Ensure uv is installed and available in your PATH
Run which uv to verify the installation path
Update Claude's configuration to point to the exact uv path using the output of whereis uv

For additional help, contact [email protected] or create a GitHub issue.

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