AutoAir: a no-code DAG builder for Apache Airflow 3

AutoAir lets you design Airflow DAGs on a visual canvas and produces readable, type-checked Python (or a JSON spec with a runtime loader, an Airflow 3.4 native YAML Dag, or dag-factory YAML). It validates with Airflow's own DagBag, deploys to a local folder, object storage or Git (direct push or pull requests), and lets you trigger, debug and version DAGs from the Airflow UI. AI agents can use the same operations through AutoAir's MCP server.

• Airflow 3.0 or later, below 4. CI covers 3.0.6, 3.1.8, 3.2.2 and 3.3.2, plus the 3.4.0b2 pre-release, on Python 3.10–3.14. Generated imports follow the target Airflow version (for example, timetables come from airflow.timetables.* on 3.0/3.1 and from airflow.sdk on 3.2+). The mcp extra cannot be installed next to Airflow 3.1 (FastMCP 4 needs Starlette 1.x); see the compatibility matrix.
• Runs inside Airflow as a plugin (Browse → DAG Builder and an AutoAir tab on every DAG page on 3.1+; a full page at /autoair/ui/ on 3.0) or standalone (autoair serve).

Install

pip install "autoair[airflow]"      # into the Airflow environment: the plugin loads automatically
pip install "autoair[standalone]"   # standalone server: autoair serve --airflow-url http://airflow:8080
uvx --from 'autoair[standalone,airflow]' autoair local --open   # try it on a laptop, no Airflow server

AI is optional and runs on pydantic-ai (like Airflow's common.ai provider): add ai plus a provider extra, e.g. pip install "autoair[ai,ai-anthropic]" (ai-openai, ai-google, ai-ollama, ai-bedrock, ai-groq, ai-mistral, ai-cohere, ai-all). Other optional extras: git, mcp, collab, collab-redis, sqlite, postgres, otel, format, shell, lsp, lsp-pyright, ai-rerank, ai-guardrails, and all for the common set. The container image ghcr.io/ctolon/autoair is the official Airflow image with AutoAir installed. See deployment.

Features

Canvas. React Flow editor with integration logos on nodes (S3, Jira, dbt, BigQuery and more, plus custom icon upload), notes, task groups, insert-on-edge, a command palette (⌘/Ctrl+K), context menus, copy/paste with id and XCom remapping, alignment guides, undo/redo, ELK auto-layout, run-state and version-diff overlays, and collapsible panels (⌘/Ctrl+B, I, J). English and Turkish UI, light and dark themes.

Authoring. Every installed operator, sensor and transfer, from official and third-party providers, plugins, DAG folders and packages, through a static AST catalog that does not import the modules. Also:

• TaskFlow tasks (@task, @task.branch, short_circuit, virtualenv, sensor, bash, docker, kubernetes, @task.stub), dynamic mapping (expand, expand_kwargs, map_index_template), task loops (3.4), setup/teardown and trigger rules.
• Callbacks and notifiers, retry policies (3.3), deadlines (3.1), human-in-the-loop operators with a form designer, OpenLineage toggles and disabled tasks.
• DAG params with a live trigger-form preview, and environment overlays (dev/staging/prod).
• Parameters that take a callable accept an import path or a function written in place. Script parameters (Bash, Spark, SQL and others) accept an embedded script file that is written to every worker at parse time.
• Hard-coded passwords and tokens are flagged with a hint to use Connections or Variables.

Scheduling. DAG time zone (DST aware), cron, presets, intervals, multi-cron, event dates, asset expressions, event-driven assets (AssetWatcher with SQS, Kafka, Pub/Sub, Redis, Service Bus or Kinesis), assets-or-time, assets-and-time (3.4) and partitioned schedules (3.2), with a "next runs" preview computed by Airflow's timetable engine.

Editors. Jinja-aware CodeMirror fields with completion for context, params, variables, connections, macros and ti.xcom_pull; drag-to-map upstream XComs; connection pickers filtered by type, with inline connection creation and testing; Python and shell editors with jedi completion, hover and signature help for the installed Airflow and providers, live ruff lint and ShellCheck diagnostics. Operator docstrings render like an IDE hover. Every field shows its Python type, whether it is required, and its description; clicking a problem jumps to the field.

Lifecycle.

• Live validation and code preview (Python, Airflow YAML, dag-factory, spec JSON), backed by a warm DagBag import-check pool.
• Test a single task or the whole DAG without the metadata database.
• Deploy with ETag optimistic locking and a three-way semantic merge dialog, with protection for hand-edited (ejected) files.
• Version history with a visual graph diff.
• Git pull-request mode (GitHub, GitLab, Bitbucket, Azure DevOps, Gitea, or any remote through the git CLI) with environment promotion.
• A deploy-target dialog that discovers where Airflow reads DAGs (DAG folder, GitDagBundles, a git-sync checkout).
• Trigger, backfill (dry run), clear, and pause or unpause from the builder; a run overlay with logs and XComs.
• Templates, reusable fragments, and import from hand-written Python DAGs, Airflow and YAML.
• An audit trail.

Collaboration and access. Live co-editing (Yjs) with presence, remote cursors and per-user undo; WebSocket access through short-lived tickets that require DAG edit permission. IAM on top of Airflow's auth manager with four-eyes approvals (IAM). Signed (Ed25519) template marketplaces (autoair marketplace keygen|build|verify).

AI and MCP. Generate a DAG from a prompt, edit with AI (reviewed as a diff), explain and fix problems, write docs and troubleshoot runs, using Anthropic, OpenAI or OpenAI-compatible servers, Gemini or Ollama, with a central or per-user model (AI architecture). The MCP server exposes authoring tools to Claude Code, Claude Desktop and other agents over stdio or streamable HTTP (MCP).

Operations. /api/health, /api/ready and Prometheus /api/metrics (under /autoair in the plugin), optional OpenTelemetry tracing, organisation policy rules (policy), state in files, SQLite or PostgreSQL, a container image with a precomputed catalog, and Helm values for the official Airflow chart.

Architecture

React 19 + @xyflow/react ── typed client (hey-api, generated from OpenAPI) ──► FastAPI (AutoAir API, MCP)
  zustand + zundo · RJSF · CodeMirror · i18next                                 │
                                                                               ├─ spec/        Pydantic v2 DagSpec + migrations (single source of truth)
                                                                               ├─ catalog/     static AST provider index (+ subprocess fallback, disk cache)
                                                                               ├─ codegen/     spec → AST → ruff · YAML (AIP-85) · dag-factory · version-aware imports
                                                                               ├─ loader/      the same AST compiled at parse time (+ environment overlays)
                                                                               ├─ validation/  graph · catalog · Jinja · policy · version gates · warm DagBag pool
                                                                               ├─ storage/     local · object (fsspec) · git (CLI, GitHub, GitLab, Bitbucket, Azure DevOps, Gitea)
                                                                               ├─ runner/      task and DAG test runs without the metadata DB, in a sandbox process
                                                                               ├─ importer/    Python DAG → spec, bulk import, code sync
                                                                               ├─ iam/         roles and permissions on top of Airflow's auth manager
                                                                               ├─ ai/ · mcp/   AI assistants and the MCP server
                                                                               ├─ collab · lsp Yjs rooms (ticket auth) · language services
                                                                               └─ gateway/     Airflow REST API v2 (caller's token forwarded → Airflow RBAC)

Development

uv sync && (cd frontend && npm ci && npm run build)
./scripts/dev-airflow.sh   # Airflow 3 + plugin at http://localhost:8080 → Browse → DAG Builder
# Git mode: AUTOAIR_DEV_GIT_REPO=file:///path/to/bare.git ./scripts/dev-airflow.sh  (adds a GitDagBundle)
uv run autoair serve --dags-folder /path/to/dags --airflow-url http://localhost:8080   # standalone
uv run autoair mcp         # MCP server (stdio)

make check     # ruff, mypy --strict, hard-coded audit, config reference, tsc, eslint, prettier
make test      # pytest (unit + real-Airflow integration) and vitest
make matrix    # nox: Airflow 3.0 / 3.1 / 3.2 / 3.3, the 3.4 pre-release, Python 3.10
make e2e       # Playwright inside the Airflow UI
make crawl     # UI crawler: opens every menu, dialog, tab and node inspector; any error fails
make codegen   # regenerate the TypeScript client after API changes

See CONTRIBUTING.md for the full workflow. autoair --help lists the CLI commands: serve, local, generate, validate, mcp, mcp-serve, ai-serve, import-python, import-yaml, export-yaml, export-dag-factory, export-schema, export-openapi, new-node, catalog, marketplace, iam, config, kb and db.

Documentation

User documentation (installation, user guide, administration, AI, extending): https://ctolon.github.io/autoair/ (source in website/; make docs-serve).

In-repo reference: configuration · configuration reference · deployment · IAM · SSO with Airflow · policy · AI architecture · AI assistants · AI troubleshooting · state and scaling · MCP · extending · roadmap · changelog

License

Apache License 2.0. See LICENSE and NOTICE. Security issues: see SECURITY.md.