mcp-paperless-ngx MCP Server

A MCP server that connects to Paperless-ngx DMS (Document Management System) and exposes its documents as resources. This server allows you to:

• View and access all your Paperless-ngx documents as resources
• Read document details including metadata
• Search documents using the Whoosh query language (Paperless-ngx's powerful search syntax)
• Generate summaries of your documents filtered by search criteria

Components

Resources

The server exposes Paperless-ngx documents as resources:

• Custom paperless:// URI scheme for accessing individual documents
• Each document resource has a name, description, and appropriate MIME type
• Document metadata like creation date, tags, and correspondents is included

Prompts

The server provides one prompt:

• summarize-documents: Creates summaries of Paperless-ngx documents
  • Optional "query" argument to filter which documents to summarize
  • Optional "style" argument to control detail level (brief/detailed)
  • Generates a prompt combining document metadata and content snippets

Tools

The server implements one tool:

• search-documents: Searches for documents in Paperless-ngx using Whoosh query language
  • Takes "query" as required string argument using Whoosh query syntax
  • Returns a list of matching documents with metadata
  • Supports advanced search features including:
    • Field-specific searches (type:invoice, correspondent:university)
    • Date-based queries (created:[2020 to 2023], added:yesterday)
    • Logical operators (AND, OR, NOT)
    • Wildcards for inexact matching (electr*)

Configuration

Environment Variables

The server requires the following environment variables to be set:

• PAPERLESS_NGX_URI: The base URL of your Paperless-ngx instance (e.g., https://paperless.example.com)
• PAPERLESS_NGX_TOKEN: An API token for authenticating with Paperless-ngx

You can create a .env file in the project root with these variables:

PAPERLESS_NGX_URI=https://your-paperless-instance.com
PAPERLESS_NGX_TOKEN=your-api-token

Creating an API Token

To create an API token for Paperless-ngx:

1. Log in to your Paperless-ngx instance
2. Go to Settings → Administration
3. Click on "API Tokens"
4. Create a new token with appropriate permissions
5. Copy the token value for the PAPERLESS_NGX_TOKEN environment variable

Quickstart

Install

Claude Desktop

On MacOS: ~/Library/Application\ Support/Claude/claude_desktop_config.json On Windows: %APPDATA%/Claude/claude_desktop_config.json

"mcpServers": {
  "mcp-paperless-ngx": {
    "command": "uvx",
    "args": [
      "mcp-paperless-ngx"
    ],
    "env": {
      "PAPERLESS_NGX_URI": "https://your-paperless-instance.com",
      "PAPERLESS_NGX_TOKEN": "your-api-token"
    }
  }
}

"mcpServers": {
  "mcp-paperless-ngx": {
    "command": "uvx",
    "args": [
      "mcp-paperless-ngx"
    ],
    "env": {
      "PAPERLESS_NGX_URI": "https://your-paperless-instance.com",
      "PAPERLESS_NGX_TOKEN": "your-api-token"
    }
  }
}

Example Usage

Once the MCP server is properly configured, you can:

1. Access documents by asking Claude to list available documents
2. Search for specific documents using natural language or specific queries
3. Get detailed information about specific documents
4. Ask Claude to summarize documents matching certain criteria

Example prompts:

• "Show me a list of my Paperless-ngx documents"
• "Search for my documents using the query: type:invoice AND (created:[2023-01-01 to 2023-12-31])"
• "Find documents with Whoosh query: correspondent:university AND tag:important"
• "Search for documents with the query: insurance contract* AND NOT expired"
• "Summarize the content of my tax documents from 2023 using query: tag:tax created:[2023-01-01 to 2023-12-31]"

Development

Building and Publishing

To prepare the package for distribution:

1. Sync dependencies and update lockfile:

uv sync

2. Build package distributions:

uv build

This will create source and wheel distributions in the dist/ directory.

3. Publish to PyPI:

uv publish

Note: You'll need to set PyPI credentials via environment variables or command flags:

• Token: --token or UV_PUBLISH_TOKEN
• Or username/password: --username/UV_PUBLISH_USERNAME and --password/UV_PUBLISH_PASSWORD

Search Syntax Reference

Paperless-ngx uses the Whoosh query language for its search functionality. This section provides a quick reference for the most common search patterns.

Basic Search

By default, Paperless returns documents that contain all words in your query:

invoice receipt

This matches documents containing both "invoice" AND "receipt".

Field-Specific Searches

You can search within specific document fields:

type:invoice                 # Documents of type "invoice"
correspondent:university     # Documents from "university" correspondent
tag:important                # Documents with "important" tag

Date-Based Searches

Search by document dates using various formats:

created:[2020 to 2023]       # Date range (created between 2020-2023)
added:yesterday              # Relative date (added yesterday)
modified:today               # Relative date (modified today)

Logical Operators

Combine terms with logical operators:

invoice AND receipt          # Documents with both terms
invoice OR receipt           # Documents with either term
invoice AND NOT paid         # Documents with "invoice" but not "paid"
invoice AND (paid OR unpaid) # More complex expressions

Inexact Matching

Search for variations of terms:

electr*                      # Wildcard search (matches "electric", "electronics", etc.)

For more details on Whoosh query syntax, see the official documentation.

Debugging

Since MCP servers run over stdio, debugging can be challenging. For the best debugging experience, we strongly recommend using the MCP Inspector.

You can launch the MCP Inspector via npm with this command:

npx @modelcontextprotocol/inspector uv run mcp-paperless-ngx

Upon launching, the Inspector will display a URL that you can access in your browser to begin debugging.