serato-dj-mcp

Ask Claude about your Serato DJ library: find tracks that mix harmonically by BPM and Camelot key, browse your crates, audit the library for duplicates and missing files, and have new crates built for you, shown to you before anything is written. It works through the Model Context Protocol (MCP), the standard way AI apps such as Claude Desktop, Claude Code, Cursor and VS Code connect to tools on your computer: this is a small local server that answers from your library and sends nothing anywhere itself.

Status: experimental. Pre-1.0 and actively developed: a minor version may change behaviour or break compatibility, a patch never does.

[!IMPORTANT] Not affiliated with, endorsed by, or supported by Serato. Serato and Serato DJ are trademarks of their respective owner. This project reads a reverse-engineered database layout and can stop working after any Serato update.

What you can ask

Once the server is connected, you talk to your assistant as usual:

• "Find tracks between 122 and 126 BPM in 8A or 9A that I added this year."
• "Give me tracks that mix harmonically out of 8A, around 124 BPM."
• "Show me what's in my Warm Up crate, in order."
• "Audit my library: duplicates, missing files, tracks that aren't in any crate."
• "Which tracks in my library have no BPM or no key?"

With crate writing switched on:

• "Build a crate called Friday Opening from the twenty tracks you just found, and show me the list before writing anything." Then, once you have closed Serato: "Apply the staged crate."

The assistant does the searching; the server answers from your library and, when asked, writes only what you approved.

Install

Works on macOS. Tested with Serato DJ Lite 4.0.9 on macOS; the test suite runs in CI on macOS and Linux with Node.js 22.16 and 24. Windows is untested — see Compatibility. The Claude Desktop extension and the Claude Code setup below were tried by hand on macOS; the Cursor and VS Code setups follow those editors' documentation and have not been tried.

Every setup starts the server read-only. Crate writing is a separate switch, described below.

Claude Desktop

As an extension (no Node.js needed). Download serato-dj-mcp-<version>.mcpb from the latest release (attached from version 0.1.1 on) and open it; Claude Desktop shows what it contains and installs it. Its settings let you point it at a library folder and switch on crate writing or raw SQL; all three can stay as they are.

Or by hand, with Node.js 22.16 or newer installed: open Settings → Developer → Edit Config and add the server to claude_desktop_config.json, then restart Claude Desktop.

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "serato": {
      "command": "npx",
      "args": ["-y", "serato-dj-mcp"]
    }
  }
}

Claude Code

claude mcp add serato -- npx -y serato-dj-mcp

Add --scope user before serato to have it in every project. The repository is also a Claude Code plugin that starts the same command.

Cursor

Add to Cursor, or add the same mcpServers entry as for Claude Desktop to ~/.cursor/mcp.json. The link opens cursor://anysphere.cursor-deeplink/mcp/install?name=serato&config=eyJjb21tYW5kIjoibnB4IiwiYXJncyI6WyIteSIsInNlcmF0by1kai1tY3AiXX0=, which asks Cursor to add {"command":"npx","args":["-y","serato-dj-mcp"]} under the name serato.

VS Code

Install in VS Code, or from a terminal:

code --add-mcp '{"name":"serato","type":"stdio","command":"npx","args":["-y","serato-dj-mcp"]}'

Options for any client

Add options after serato-dj-mcp in args, for example "args": ["-y", "serato-dj-mcp", "--allow-writes"]:

• --library <path> — the Serato library folder (the one holding master.sqlite). Not needed on macOS, where the library in ~/Library/Application Support/Serato and on mounted drives is found automatically.
• --allow-writes — crate writing, see below.
• --allow-raw-sql — adds run_sql, read-only SQL for developers.

All options are listed under Options.

node:sqlite is an experimental Node API and prints a warning to stderr; that is expected and harmless, because the MCP protocol travels over stdout.

From source, for developers

git clone https://github.com/Venut-Technologies/serato-dj-mcp.git
cd serato-dj-mcp
npm ci
npm run build

Then use "command": "node" with "args": ["/absolute/path/to/serato-dj-mcp/dist/index.js"], or claude mcp add serato -- node /absolute/path/to/serato-dj-mcp/dist/index.js.

What the server reads, writes and sends is in PRIVACY.md: it makes no network requests and has no telemetry.

Compatibility

Everything this server assumes about the Serato library is written down in docs/serato-4x-notes.md, with the measurement behind each claim.

Read-only by default, writes on request

By default the server never writes to Serato's files. Every read goes through a snapshot copy of the library database in --cache-dir, so a question from the assistant cannot change your library, whether Serato is open or not.

Two flags widen that, and each registers extra tools only when it is given — a tool that does not exist cannot be called by mistake:

• --allow-raw-sql adds run_sql: read-only SELECT against the snapshot, returning raw rows.
• --allow-writes adds stage_crate, preview_changes, apply_changes and discard_changes. Writing is split in two: crates are staged first, which never touches the library, and are applied only when you confirm and Serato is closed. Both databases are backed up before every write. The details are in Writing to the library.

Tools

• list_libraries — the libraries this server can see, with version, schema version and locations. Paths here are not redacted, so you can copy one into --library.
• search_tracks — search by free text, BPM, key, genre, rating, date added, crate membership and flags. Tonality is Camelot; a track whose key Serato itself could not parse is still matched, and key_source says where the key came from. Paginated with an opaque cursor; the default page is 25 tracks and nine fields.
• get_tracks — fetch tracks by the ids search_tracks returned. Unknown ids come back in missing rather than being dropped.
• list_crates — the crates in the Serato Library space, with their display path and how many distinct tracks each holds. Smart crates, space roots and Serato's other internal spaces (such as the Prepare panel) are not listed.
• get_crate_tracks — the tracks of one crate, in the crate's own order. Only crates in the Serato Library space can be given.
• audit_library — diagnose the library. Every check runs by default and reports a count plus up to ten example track ids: tracks with no BPM, with no key at all, with a key Serato itself cannot display, marked stale, in no crate, streaming-only, duplicated, and with broken paths. duplicates reports groups instead of loose ids, because which track duplicates which is the part you can act on. broken_paths reads Serato's own missing flag by default; pass check_filesystem: true to also look on disk, which is opt-in because a stat against a disconnected drive blocks for seconds. A drive that is not mounted is reported as such rather than having all its tracks declared missing.
• run_sql — one read-only SELECT against a snapshot copy. Registered only with --allow-raw-sql, because it returns raw rows with no path redaction.

With --allow-writes:

• stage_crate — stage a new crate from track ids. Nothing is written yet; the response lists every staged track by title and artist, so check it.
• preview_changes — show what is staged, with format: "detail" down to each track.
• apply_changes — write everything staged, all or nothing. Refused while Serato is running.
• discard_changes — drop one staged crate, or all of them.

Options

--library <path>, --root <dir> (repeatable), --cache-dir <dir>, --state-dir <dir>, --allow-raw-sql, --allow-writes, --help, --version. SERATO_LIBRARY_PATH is an alternative to --library; the flag wins. An unknown option is an error, not a no-op.

Writing to the library

Writes need --allow-writes and happen in two steps, because Serato must be closed while its database is written and the model usually works while it is open. stage_crate can run at any time; apply_changes refuses while Serato is running. Start Serato afterwards and the new crates appear within a few seconds.

What a write does: it creates new crates at the top level of the Serato Library, in root.sqlite, and nothing else. It never changes or deletes an existing crate, never edits a track, never touches master.sqlite, database V2 or the Subcrates folder — Serato regenerates those itself.

Before every write both databases are backed up under <state-dir>/backups/<library-id>/<timestamp>/ (default state-dir: ~/Library/Application Support/serato-dj-mcp), and the last ten are kept. A backup is taken on every apply_changes attempt that reaches the backup step, including attempts that are then refused inside the transaction (a name conflict, for example) — so "the last ten" means the last ten attempts, not ten successful writes, and the newest one may already contain the write you are trying to undo.

There is no undo tool. To undo a specific write, first find the right backup: use the backup_paths returned by that apply_changes call, or open <state-dir>/manifests/<library-id>.jsonl and take the backup_paths of the line whose "commit_state" is "committed". <library-id> is the uuid reported by list_libraries. Then, with that pair of paths in hand:

1. Quit Serato.
2. In the library folder, delete root.sqlite-journal if present, and delete master.sqlite-wal and master.sqlite-shm.
3. Copy the backed-up root.sqlite and master.sqlite into the library folder, replacing the current ones.
4. Delete ~/Music/_Serato_/Subcrates/<crate name>.crate — Serato exported it after it synced the crate, and copying the databases back does not remove it.

Restoring these files also rolls back anything Serato itself recorded in the library after that backup was taken.

Nested crates are not supported: a crate created this way inside another crate is deleted by Serato when it next syncs, so every crate goes to the top level.

Privacy

The same, as a standalone policy with the source file behind each statement: PRIVACY.md.

• Everything runs on your computer. The server is a local process your MCP client starts. It sends no telemetry, has no analytics, and makes no network requests. The only other program it runs is ps, to check whether Serato is running before a write.
• What it reads: Serato's library databases, always read-only except for apply_changes; with audit_library's check_filesystem: true, the file metadata of your tracks on disk.
• What it writes, and where:
  • --cache-dir (default ~/Library/Caches/serato-dj-mcp) holds a snapshot copy of your library database. Safe to delete at any time.
  • --state-dir (default ~/Library/Application Support/serato-dj-mcp) holds staged crates, a manifest of every write, lock files, and backups of your library databases. Only used with --allow-writes. Deleting it deletes those backups.
  • With --allow-writes, apply_changes writes new crates into Serato's root.sqlite.
• What leaves your computer is up to your MCP client. Tool results — track titles, artists, crate names, file paths — go to your assistant, and from there to whichever model provider the client uses. Track paths under your home folder are shortened to ~; list_libraries, run_sql and the backup paths returned by apply_changes are full paths. Check your client's data policy if that matters to you.

Limitations

Read this before deciding what to trust.

• Serato DJ 3.x is not supported. It is recognised and reported as version: "3.x", but nothing reads it — it stores a binary database V2 rather than SQLite. No tool will return data from a 3.x library.
• Reads go through a snapshot, so an answer reflects the library as of the last snapshot, not the current instant. A snapshot is reused for up to two seconds, so while Serato is writing an answer can be that far behind. Only the current snapshot of each library is kept in --cache-dir; older ones are deleted as soon as a newer one is published.
• Two audit checks rest on column semantics this project has not confirmed. stale reads is_stale and streaming_only reads third_party_type; both were zero on every track of the reference library, so their counts are reported without any claim about what they mean.
• rating and the streaming flag are passed through uninterpreted. rating was NULL or 0 on all 118 tracks of the reference library, so the top of the scale is unconfirmed. No meaning beyond the raw column value is claimed for the streaming flag.
• analysis_flags bit 2 is claimed, though the rest of the field is not. It is read as "Serato ran its own analysis" — not the same as "has a BPM", since a BPM can come from the file's tags — and exposed as flags.analyzed, which search_tracks can filter on. Measured 2026-09-06 on 118 tracks: 106 have bit 2 set, of which 104 have a BPM; twelve have it clear — six sound effects and six tracks whose BPM came from tags rather than Serato's own analysis.
• Free-text search is not Serato's search. Serato normalises text with a function only its own process has, so q matches both the normalised columns and the raw ones and can differ from what the application would find.
• A page taken while Serato is writing can straddle two snapshots. Pagination is keyset, so it continues from the same position on the newer copy and says so in warnings: snapshot_advanced; a few rows may be repeated or skipped at the seam.
• Crate writing is new and experimental. The write protocol was worked out against a live Serato DJ Lite 4.0.9 library, but it has not been exercised across Serato updates, on large libraries, or on libraries spread over external drives. Keep your own backups as well.
• Writes are narrow on purpose. apply_changes creates new top-level crates and nothing else: no nested crates, no smart crates, no renaming, reordering or deleting crates, no edits to tracks, cue points or other metadata.
• A crate can only hold tracks from the library's own disk. Streaming tracks, and tracks that live in another drive's Serato store, are refused by stage_crate, naming each one.
• Serato must be closed to apply, and restarted to see the result. New crates show up in Serato, and in this server's read tools, only after Serato has started and synced.
• Staging reads Serato's live database. stage_crate reads root.sqlite while Serato may be running. Measured on 2026-09-16: three stagings of 50 tracks each, 8 to 41 ms apiece, with nothing in Serato's own log for those seconds. That is evidence, not a guarantee — a busier library, or a Serato in the middle of its own write, has not been tried.
• There is no undo tool. Undoing a write means restoring the backups by hand, as described above.

Principles

What this server guarantees about your library, and what it refuses to do, is stated in PRINCIPLES.md — each guarantee with the code that enforces it and the tests that would fail if it stopped being true.

Security

Please report vulnerabilities privately — see SECURITY.md. Do not open a public issue for them.

Contributing

Issues and pull requests are welcome; start with CONTRIBUTING.md. Changes are recorded in CHANGELOG.md.

License

MIT. Maintained by Venut Technologies.

Serato and Serato DJ are trademarks of their respective owner. This project is independent and is not affiliated with, endorsed by, or supported by Serato.