The Pinata Model Context Protocol (MCP) server allows Claude to interact with both Public and Private IPFS through Pinata's API. This integration enables Claude to upload, search, manage, and access files stored on IPFS via Pinata.
Run the following command and follow the prompts:
claude mcp add
When prompted, provide these details:
pinata
npx
pinata-mcp /path/to/allowed/directories /another/path/to/allowed/directories
PINATA_JWT=<YOUR_JWT>,GATEWAY_URL=example.mypinata.cloud
Add the following configuration to your claude_desktop_config.json
file:
{
"mcpServers": {
"pinata": {
"command": "npx",
"args": [
"pinata-mcp",
"/path/to/allowed/directory"
],
"env": {
"PINATA_JWT": "<YOUR_JWT>",
"GATEWAY_URL": "example.mypinata.cloud"
}
}
}
}
After installation, start Claude Code with the claude
command or launch Claude Desktop. The Pinata MCP provides the following capabilities:
Here are some example prompts you can use with Claude to interact with Pinata:
Please upload the file at ~/Pictures/example.jpg to my Pinata account as a private file named 'My Example Image'
Search my Pinata account for all PNG files
Create a new group called 'Project Assets' on Pinata, then find all my JSON files and add them to this group
Fetch the content with CID QmX... from IPFS and save it to my Downloads folder
If you encounter any issues, you can send an email to [email protected] for assistance.
To add this MCP server to Claude Code, run this command in your terminal:
claude mcp add-json "pinata" '{"command":"npx","args":["pinata-mcp","/path/to/allowed/directory"],"env":{"PINATA_JWT":"<YOUR_JWT>","GATEWAY_URL":"example.mypinata.cloud"}}'
See the official Claude Code MCP documentation for more details.
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.
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": {
"pinata": {
"command": "npx",
"args": [
"pinata-mcp",
"/path/to/allowed/directory"
],
"env": {
"PINATA_JWT": "<YOUR_JWT>",
"GATEWAY_URL": "example.mypinata.cloud"
}
}
}
}
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.
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.
To add this MCP server to Claude Desktop:
1. Find your configuration file:
~/Library/Application Support/Claude/claude_desktop_config.json
%APPDATA%\Claude\claude_desktop_config.json
~/.config/Claude/claude_desktop_config.json
2. Add this to your configuration file:
{
"mcpServers": {
"pinata": {
"command": "npx",
"args": [
"pinata-mcp",
"/path/to/allowed/directory"
],
"env": {
"PINATA_JWT": "<YOUR_JWT>",
"GATEWAY_URL": "example.mypinata.cloud"
}
}
}
}
3. Restart Claude Desktop for the changes to take effect