MCP Gsheets

What freema/mcp-gsheets MCP server does

The freema/mcp-gsheets MCP server exposes Google Sheets operations to MCP-compatible clients. It is intended for agents that need to work with spreadsheet documents rather than only retrieve data. The README describes support for reading and writing spreadsheet content, managing sheets, applying formatting, creating charts, and configuring conditional formatting.

The project is written in TypeScript and targets Node.js 20 or later. It is distributed as the mcp-gsheets npm package, so an MCP client can launch it locally with npx. The repository is licensed under MIT.

How it works

The server runs as a local MCP process started by the client. The client configuration specifies the npx command and the mcp-gsheets@latest package. Google Sheets access is provided through a Google Cloud service account, and the spreadsheets must be shared with that account before the server can work with them.

Google Sheets API access must be enabled in a Google Cloud project. The standard configuration uses GOOGLE_PROJECT_ID together with GOOGLE_APPLICATION_CREDENTIALS, which points to a service-account JSON key file. The project also supports supplying the complete service-account JSON through GOOGLE_SERVICE_ACCOUNT_KEY, or providing the service account's private key and email through GOOGLE_PRIVATE_KEY and GOOGLE_CLIENT_EMAIL.

Setup and configuration

To install the freema/mcp-gsheets MCP server through an MCP client, configure it with npx, the -y flag, and mcp-gsheets@latest. Add the Google environment variables to the same client configuration. The README provides configuration examples for Claude Code, Claude Desktop, Cursor, Cline, and other clients that use the standard MCP server format.

Before starting the server, create or select a Google Cloud project, enable the Google Sheets API, create a service account, and download its JSON key. Share each spreadsheet with the service account email and grant the required Editor permission. For JSON-string authentication, the credential object must be represented on one line with escaped quotes and newline characters. For private-key authentication, the key must retain its PEM markers and encode newlines as \\n.

Local contributors can clone the repository, run npm install, and build it with npm run build. The repository also includes an interactive npm run setup command for generating local MCP client configuration and optionally creating a development .env file.

Tools and capabilities

The freema/mcp-gsheets MCP server supports the following capability areas described by the project:

• Reading spreadsheet data
• Writing spreadsheet data
• Batch spreadsheet operations
• Sheet and spreadsheet management
• Cell and sheet formatting
• Chart operations
• Conditional formatting

The README does not provide individual MCP tool names or parameter schemas, so those details should be checked in the package or client tool discovery after installation.

Limitations and notes

This server requires Node.js 20 or newer and a Google Cloud project with the Sheets API enabled. It does not describe OAuth-based user authentication; the documented methods use a Google service account. Access depends on sharing the target spreadsheets with that service account.

Credential files and inline private keys contain sensitive information and should be protected. Inline JSON credentials are mainly described for containerized or CI/CD environments, while file-based credentials use an absolute path. The README documents local execution and client configuration, but does not state that the server provides a hosted remote endpoint.