linkwarden-mcp

MCP server for self-hosted Linkwarden: ask your AI about bookmarks, collections, and tags.

What is Linkwarden?

Linkwarden is a self-hosted, open-source bookmark manager. You collect, organize, annotate, and preserve webpages in one place, with full-page archives so content stays readable after the original page disappears. It also supports collaboration and public sharing.

This project wires the Linkwarden HTTP API into the Model Context Protocol so Cursor, Claude, VS Code Copilot, and other MCP hosts can query your live library in natural language.

Useful Linkwarden links:

• Documentation
• GitHub
• Cloud
• Demo
• Self-hosting setup

What this server does

Default is read-only. You get:

• 18 read tools - discovery (list_resources), six core reads (search, get, preserved content, collections, tags, overview), and eleven triage/hygiene workflows
• Task tools (opt-in) - intent-shaped writes such as save_link, smart_save_link, organise_links, create_collection, apply_triage_plan (register when matching write scopes are set)
• Delete tools (opt-in) - delete_links, delete_tags, merge_tags, delete_collection (register only under delete scopes; never implied by write)
• Hard denylist - tokens, session, auth, user admin (except GET /api/v1/users/me), migration, and whole-instance preservation stay blocked even when writes are on

Transport is stdio. No HTTP server. No global install required if you use uv / uvx.

Branding / icons

Four surfaces (keep them in sync when the mark changes):

1. stdio hosts (Cursor, Claude Desktop via mcp.json): serverInfo.icons from server_icons() — embedded data URI from src/linkwarden_mcp/assets/icon.png, plus HTTPS fallback docs/icon-512.png (https://raw.githubusercontent.com/flumpiey/linkwarden-mcp/main/docs/icon-512.png). website_url is https://linkwarden.app/.
2. Cursor plugin: .cursor-plugin/plugin.json logo → docs/linkwarden-icon.svg.
3. Claude Desktop Extension: mcpb/icon.png (packed with npx @anthropic-ai/mcpb pack mcpb).
4. Claude.ai remote connectors: Claude.ai ignores serverInfo.icons and uses the root-domain favicon of the connector URL. If you host a remote MCP later, serve docs/favicon.ico at the registrable domain root (e.g. https://acme.com/favicon.ico for https://mcp.acme.com/...).

server.json registry metadata also points its icons[0].src at the same raw docs/icon-512.png URL.

Requirements

• Python ≥ 3.10 (pulled in automatically by uvx)
• uv (provides uvx)
• A reachable Linkwarden instance: LINKWARDEN_API_URL + LINKWARDEN_API_KEY

Access token

1. Sign in to your Linkwarden instance (self-hosted or Cloud).
2. Open Settings → Access Tokens (or go to /settings/access-tokens).
3. Create a New Access Token, give it a name, and copy the value into LINKWARDEN_API_KEY.
4. Set LINKWARDEN_API_URL to your instance base URL (usually without /api/v1; include /api/v1 only if your deployment requires it), e.g. https://links.example.com or local Docker http://127.0.0.1:3000.

linkwarden-mcp sends the token as Authorization: Bearer …. API overview: API Introduction.

Copy .env.example to .env for local runs — never commit .env. Prefer the Cursor plugin Configure UI for credentials, or a secret manager in production.

Quick start

Run the PyPI package with uvx:

uvx linkwarden-mcp

Paste a client config below, set LINKWARDEN_API_URL / LINKWARDEN_API_KEY, restart the host, then ask: “Find my unread bookmarks about Python” or “What's in my Dev collection?”

From a git clone (dev): uvx --from git+https://github.com/flumpiey/linkwarden-mcp linkwarden-mcp or uv run --directory /path/to/linkwarden-mcp linkwarden-mcp.

Installation

Configs below pull linkwarden-mcp from PyPI. Leave write-scope env vars unset for read-only.

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "linkwarden": {
      "type": "stdio",
      "command": "uvx",
      "args": ["linkwarden-mcp"],
      "env": {
        "LINKWARDEN_API_URL": "https://links.example.com",
        "LINKWARDEN_API_KEY": "your-token"
      }
    }
  }
}

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "linkwarden": {
      "type": "stdio",
      "command": "uv",
      "args": ["run", "--directory", "/path/to/linkwarden-mcp", "linkwarden-mcp"],
      "env": {
        "LINKWARDEN_API_URL": "https://links.example.com",
        "LINKWARDEN_API_KEY": "your-token"
      }
    }
  }
}

"LINKWARDEN_MCP_WRITE_SCOPES": "links,collections",
"LINKWARDEN_MCP_DELETE_SCOPES": "links"

npx @anthropic-ai/mcpb pack mcpb

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "linkwarden": {
      "command": "uvx",
      "args": ["linkwarden-mcp"],
      "env": {
        "LINKWARDEN_API_URL": "https://links.example.com",
        "LINKWARDEN_API_KEY": "your-token"
      }
    }
  }
}

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "linkwarden": {
      "command": "uv",
      "args": ["run", "--directory", "/path/to/linkwarden-mcp", "linkwarden-mcp"],
      "env": {
        "LINKWARDEN_API_URL": "https://links.example.com",
        "LINKWARDEN_API_KEY": "your-token"
      }
    }
  }
}

claude mcp add linkwarden --env LINKWARDEN_API_URL=https://links.example.com --env LINKWARDEN_API_KEY=your-token -- uvx linkwarden-mcp