GitHub MCP Server

The GitHub MCP Server is a Model Context Protocol (MCP) server that provides seamless integration with GitHub APIs, enabling advanced automation and interaction capabilities for developers and tools.

Use Cases

Automating GitHub workflows and processes.
Extracting and analyzing data from GitHub repositories.
Building AI powered tools and applications that interact with GitHub's ecosystem.

Prerequisites

To run the server in a container, you will need to have Docker installed.
Once Docker is installed, you will also need to ensure Docker is running. The image is public; if you get errors on pull, you may have an expired token and need to docker logout ghcr.io.
Lastly you will need to Create a GitHub Personal Access Token. The MCP server can use many of the GitHub APIs, so enable the permissions that you feel comfortable granting your AI tools (to learn more about access tokens, please check out the documentation).

Installation

Usage with VS Code

For quick installation, use one of the one-click install buttons at the top of this README. Once you complete that flow, toggle Agent mode (located by the Copilot Chat text input) and the server will start.

For manual installation, add the following JSON block to your User Settings (JSON) file in VS Code. You can do this by pressing Ctrl + Shift + P and typing Preferences: Open User Settings (JSON).

{
  "mcp": {
    "inputs": [
      {
        "type": "promptString",
        "id": "github_token",
        "description": "GitHub Personal Access Token",
        "password": true
      }
    ],
    "servers": {
      "github": {
        "command": "docker",
        "args": [
          "run",
          "-i",
          "--rm",
          "-e",
          "GITHUB_PERSONAL_ACCESS_TOKEN",
          "ghcr.io/github/github-mcp-server"
        ],
        "env": {
          "GITHUB_PERSONAL_ACCESS_TOKEN": "${input:github_token}"
        }
      }
    }
  }
}

Optionally, you can add a similar example (i.e. without the mcp key) to a file called .vscode/mcp.json in your workspace. This will allow you to share the configuration with others.

{
  "inputs": [
    {
      "type": "promptString",
      "id": "github_token",
      "description": "GitHub Personal Access Token",
      "password": true
    }
  ],
  "servers": {
    "github": {
      "command": "docker",
      "args": [
        "run",
        "-i",
        "--rm",
        "-e",
        "GITHUB_PERSONAL_ACCESS_TOKEN",
        "ghcr.io/github/github-mcp-server"
      ],
      "env": {
        "GITHUB_PERSONAL_ACCESS_TOKEN": "${input:github_token}"
      }
    }
  }
}

More about using MCP server tools in VS Code's agent mode documentation.

Usage with Claude Desktop

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "github": {
      "command": "docker",
      "args": [
        "run",
        "-i",
        "--rm",
        "-e",
        "GITHUB_PERSONAL_ACCESS_TOKEN",
        "ghcr.io/github/github-mcp-server"
      ],
      "env": {
        "GITHUB_PERSONAL_ACCESS_TOKEN": "<YOUR_TOKEN>"
      }
    }
  }
}

Build from source

If you don't have Docker, you can use go build to build the binary in the cmd/github-mcp-server directory, and use the github-mcp-server stdio command with the GITHUB_PERSONAL_ACCESS_TOKEN environment variable set to your token. To specify the output location of the build, use the -o flag. You should configure your server to use the built executable as its command. For example:

{
  "mcp": {
    "servers": {
      "github": {
        "command": "/path/to/github-mcp-server",
        "args": ["stdio"],
        "env": {
          "GITHUB_PERSONAL_ACCESS_TOKEN": "<YOUR_TOKEN>"
        }
      }
    }
  }
}

Tool Configuration

The GitHub MCP Server supports enabling or disabling specific groups of functionalities via the --toolsets flag. This allows you to control which GitHub API capabilities are available to your AI tools. Enabling only the toolsets that you need can help the LLM with tool choice and reduce the context size.

Available Toolsets

The following sets of tools are available (all are on by default):

Toolset	Description
`repos`	Repository-related tools (file operations, branches, commits)
`issues`	Issue-related tools (create, read, update, comment)
`users`	Anything relating to GitHub Users
`pull_requests`	Pull request operations (create, merge, review)
`code_security`	Code scanning alerts and security features
`experiments`	Experimental features (not considered stable)

Specifying Toolsets

To specify toolsets you want available to the LLM, you can pass an allow-list in two ways:

Using Command Line Argument:

github-mcp-server --toolsets repos,issues,pull_requests,code_security

Using Environment Variable:

GITHUB_TOOLSETS="repos,issues,pull_requests,code_security" ./github-mcp-server

The environment variable GITHUB_TOOLSETS takes precedence over the command line argument if both are provided.

Using Toolsets With Docker

When using Docker, you can pass the toolsets as environment variables:

docker run -i --rm \
  -e GITHUB_PERSONAL_ACCESS_TOKEN=<your-token> \
  -e GITHUB_TOOLSETS="repos,issues,pull_requests,code_security,experiments" \
  ghcr.io/github/github-mcp-server

The "all" Toolset

The special toolset all can be provided to enable all available toolsets regardless of any other configuration:

./github-mcp-server --toolsets all

Or using the environment variable:

GITHUB_TOOLSETS="all" ./github-mcp-server

Dynamic Tool Discovery

Note: This feature is currently in beta and may not be available in all environments. Please test it out and let us know if you encounter any issues.

Instead of starting with all tools enabled, you can turn on dynamic toolset discovery. Dynamic toolsets allow the MCP host to list and enable toolsets in response to a user prompt. This should help to avoid situations where the model gets confused by the sheer number of tools available.

Using Dynamic Tool Discovery

When using the binary, you can pass the --dynamic-toolsets flag.

./github-mcp-server --dynamic-toolsets

When using Docker, you can pass the toolsets as environment variables:

docker run -i --rm \
  -e GITHUB_PERSONAL_ACCESS_TOKEN=<your-token> \
  -e GITHUB_DYNAMIC_TOOLSETS=1 \
  ghcr.io/github/github-mcp-server

GitHub Enterprise Server

The flag --gh-host and the environment variable GITHUB_HOST can be used to set the GitHub Enterprise Server hostname. Prefix the hostname with the https:// URI scheme, as it otherwise defaults to http:// which GitHub Enterprise Server does not support.

"github": {
    "command": "docker",
    "args": [
    "run",
    "-i",
    "--rm",
    "-e",
    "GITHUB_PERSONAL_ACCESS_TOKEN",
    "-e",
    "GITHUB_HOST",
    "ghcr.io/github/github-mcp-server"
    ],
    "env": {
        "GITHUB_PERSONAL_ACCESS_TOKEN": "${input:github_token}",
        "GITHUB_HOST": "https://<your GHES domain name>"
    }
}

i18n / Overriding Descriptions

The descriptions of the tools can be overridden by creating a github-mcp-server-config.json file in the same directory as the binary.

The file should contain a JSON object with the tool names as keys and the new descriptions as values. For example:

{
  "TOOL_ADD_ISSUE_COMMENT_DESCRIPTION": "an alternative description",
  "TOOL_CREATE_BRANCH_DESCRIPTION": "Create a new branch in a GitHub repository"
}

You can create an export of the current translations by running the binary with the --export-translations flag.

This flag will preserve any translations/overrides you have made, while adding any new translations that have been added to the binary since the last time you exported.

./github-mcp-server --export-translations
cat github-mcp-server-config.json

You can also use ENV vars to override the descriptions. The environment variable names are the same as the keys in the JSON file, prefixed with GITHUB_MCP_ and all uppercase.

For example, to override the TOOL_ADD_ISSUE_COMMENT_DESCRIPTION tool, you can set the following environment variable:

export GITHUB_MCP_TOOL_ADD_ISSUE_COMMENT_DESCRIPTION="an alternative description"

Tools

Users

get_me - Get details of the authenticated user
- No parameters required

Issues

get_issue - Gets the contents of an issue within a repository
- owner: Repository owner (string, required)
- repo: Repository name (string, required)
- issue_number: Issue number (number, required)
get_issue_comments - Get comments for a GitHub issue
- owner: Repository owner (string, required)
- repo: Repository name (string, required)
- issue_number: Issue number (number, required)
create_issue - Create a new issue in a GitHub repository
- owner: Repository owner (string, required)
- repo: Repository name (string, required)
- title: Issue title (string, required)
- body: Issue body content (string, optional)
- assignees: Usernames to assign to this issue (string[], optional)
- labels: Labels to apply to this issue (string[], optional)
add_issue_comment - Add a comment to an issue
- owner: Repository owner (string, required)
- repo: Repository name (string, required)
- issue_number: Issue number (number, required)
- body: Comment text (string, required)
list_issues - List and filter repository issues
- owner: Repository owner (string, required)
- repo: Repository name (string, required)
- state: Filter by state ('open', 'closed', 'all') (string, optional)
- labels: Labels to filter by (string[], optional)
- sort: Sort by ('created', 'updated', 'comments') (string, optional)
- direction: Sort direction ('asc', 'desc') (string, optional)
- since: Filter by date (ISO 8601 timestamp) (string, optional)
- page: Page number (number, optional)
- perPage: Results per page (number, optional)
update_issue - Update an existing issue in a GitHub repository
- owner: Repository owner (string, required)
- repo: Repository name (string, required)
- issue_number: Issue number to update (number, required)
- title: New title (string, optional)
- body: New description (string, optional)
- state: New state ('open' or 'closed') (string, optional)
- labels: New labels (string[], optional)
- assignees: New assignees (string[], optional)
- milestone: New milestone number (number, optional)
search_issues - Search for issues and pull requests
- query: Search query (string, required)
- sort: Sort field (string, optional)
- order: Sort order (string, optional)
- page: Page number (number, optional)
- perPage: Results per page (number, optional)

Pull Requests

get_pull_request - Get details of a specific pull request
- owner: Repository owner (string, required)
- repo: Repository name (string, required)
- pullNumber: Pull request number (number, required)
list_pull_requests - List and filter repository pull requests
- owner: Repository owner (string, required)
- repo: Repository name (string, required)
- state: PR state (string, optional)
- sort: Sort field (string, optional)
- direction: Sort direction (string, optional)
- perPage: Results per page (number, optional)
- page: Page number (number, optional)
merge_pull_request - Merge a pull request
- owner: Repository owner (string, required)
- repo: Repository name (string, required)
- pullNumber: Pull request number (number, required)
- commit_title: Title for the merge commit (string, optional)
- commit_message: Message for the merge commit (string, optional)
- merge_method: Merge method (string, optional)
get_pull_request_files - Get the list of files changed in a pull request
- owner: Repository owner (string, required)
- repo: Repository name (string, required)
- pullNumber: Pull request number (number, required)
get_pull_request_status - Get the combined status of all status checks for a pull request
- owner: Repository owner (string, required)
- repo: Repository name (string, required)
- pullNumber: Pull request number (number, required)
update_pull_request_branch - Update a pull request branch with the latest changes from the base branch
- owner: Repository owner (string, required)
- repo: Repository name (string, required)
- pullNumber: Pull request number (number, required)
- expectedHeadSha: The expected SHA of the pull request's HEAD ref (string, optional)
get_pull_request_comments - Get the review comments on a pull request
- owner: Repository owner (string, required)
- repo: Repository name (string, required)
- pullNumber: Pull request number (number, required)
get_pull_request_reviews - Get the reviews on a pull request
- owner: Repository owner (string, required)
- repo: Repository name (string, required)
- pullNumber: Pull request number (number, required)
create_pull_request_review - Create a review on a pull request review
- owner: Repository owner (string, required)
- repo: Repository name (string, required)
- pullNumber: Pull request number (number, required)
- body: Review comment text (string, optional)
- event: Review action ('APPROVE', 'REQUEST_CHANGES', 'COMMENT') (string, required)
- commitId: SHA of commit to review (string, optional)
- comments: Line-specific comments array of objects to place comments on pull request changes (array, optional)
  - For inline comments: provide path, position (or line), and body
  - For multi-line comments: provide path, start_line, line, optional side/start_side, and body
create_pull_request - Create a new pull request
- owner: Repository owner (string, required)
- repo: Repository name (string, required)
- title: PR title (string, required)
- body: PR description (string, optional)
- head: Branch containing changes (string, required)
- base: Branch to merge into (string, required)
- draft: Create as draft PR (boolean, optional)
- maintainer_can_modify: Allow maintainer edits (boolean, optional)
add_pull_request_review_comment - Add a review comment to a pull request or reply to an existing comment
- owner: Repository owner (string, required)
- repo: Repository name (string, required)
- pull_number: Pull request number (number, required)
- body: The text of the review comment (string, required)
- commit_id: The SHA of the commit to comment on (string, required unless using in_reply_to)
- path: The relative path to the file that necessitates a comment (string, required unless using in_reply_to)
- line: The line of the blob in the pull request diff that the comment applies to (number, optional)
- side: The side of the diff to comment on (LEFT or RIGHT) (string, optional)
- start_line: For multi-line comments, the first line of the range (number, optional)
- start_side: For multi-line comments, the starting side of the diff (LEFT or RIGHT) (string, optional)
- subject_type: The level at which the comment is targeted (line or file) (string, optional)
- in_reply_to: The ID of the review comment to reply to (number, optional). When specified, only body is required and other parameters are ignored.
update_pull_request - Update an existing pull request in a GitHub repository
- owner: Repository owner (string, required)
- repo: Repository name (string, required)
- pullNumber: Pull request number to update (number, required)
- title: New title (string, optional)
- body: New description (string, optional)
- state: New state ('open' or 'closed') (string, optional)
- base: New base branch name (string, optional)
- maintainer_can_modify: Allow maintainer edits (boolean, optional)

Repositories

create_or_update_file - Create or update a single file in a repository
- owner: Repository owner (string, required)
- repo: Repository name (string, required)
- path: File path (string, required)
- message: Commit message (string, required)
- content: File content (string, required)
- branch: Branch name (string, optional)
- sha: File SHA if updating (string, optional)
list_branches - List branches in a GitHub repository
- owner: Repository owner (string, required)
- repo: Repository name (string, required)
- page: Page number (number, optional)
- perPage: Results per page (number, optional)
push_files - Push multiple files in a single commit
- owner: Repository owner (string, required)
- repo: Repository name (string, required)
- branch: Branch to push to (string, required)
- files: Files to push, each with path and content (array, required)
- message: Commit message (string, required)
search_repositories - Search for GitHub repositories
- query: Search query (string, required)
- sort: Sort field (string, optional)
- order: Sort order (string, optional)
- page: Page number (number, optional)
- perPage: Results per page (number, optional)
create_repository - Create a new GitHub repository
- name: Repository name (string, required)
- description: Repository description (string, optional)
- private: Whether the repository is private (boolean, optional)
- autoInit: Auto-initialize with README (boolean, optional)
get_file_contents - Get contents of a file or directory
- owner: Repository owner (string, required)
- repo: Repository name (string, required)
- path: File path (string, required)
- ref: Git reference (string, optional)
fork_repository - Fork a repository
- owner: Repository owner (string, required)
- repo: Repository name (string, required)
- organization: Target organization name (string, optional)
create_branch - Create a new branch
- owner: Repository owner (string, required)
- repo: Repository name (string, required)
- branch: New branch name (string, required)
- sha: SHA to create branch from (string, required)
list_commits - Get a list of commits of a branch in a repository
- owner: Repository owner (string, required)
- repo: Repository name (string, required)
- sha: Branch name, tag, or commit SHA (string, optional)
- path: Only commits containing this file path (string, optional)
- page: Page number (number, optional)
- perPage: Results per page (number, optional)
get_commit - Get details for a commit from a repository
- owner: Repository owner (string, required)
- repo: Repository name (string, required)
- sha: Commit SHA, branch name, or tag name (string, required)
- page: Page number, for files in the commit (number, optional)
- perPage: Results per page, for files in the commit (number, optional)
search_code - Search for code across GitHub repositories
- query: Search query (string, required)
- sort: Sort field (string, optional)
- order: Sort order (string, optional)
- page: Page number (number, optional)
- perPage: Results per page (number, optional)

Users

search_users - Search for GitHub users
- q: Search query (string, required)
- sort: Sort field (string, optional)
- order: Sort order (string, optional)
- page: Page number (number, optional)
- perPage: Results per page (number, optional)

Code Scanning

get_code_scanning_alert - Get a code scanning alert
- owner: Repository owner (string, required)
- repo: Repository name (string, required)
- alertNumber: Alert number (number, required)
list_code_scanning_alerts - List code scanning alerts for a repository
- owner: Repository owner (string, required)
- repo: Repository name (string, required)
- ref: Git reference (string, optional)
- state: Alert state (string, optional)
- severity: Alert severity (string, optional)
- tool_name: The name of the tool used for code scanning (string, optional)

Secret Scanning

get_secret_scanning_alert - Get a secret scanning alert
- owner: Repository owner (string, required)
- repo: Repository name (string, required)
- alertNumber: Alert number (number, required)
list_secret_scanning_alerts - List secret scanning alerts for a repository
- owner: Repository owner (string, required)
- repo: Repository name (string, required)
- state: Alert state (string, optional)
- secret_type: The secret types to be filtered for in a comma-separated list (string, optional)
- resolution: The resolution status (string, optional)

Resources

Repository Content

Get Repository Content Retrieves the content of a repository at a specific path.
- Template: repo://{owner}/{repo}/contents{/path*}
- Parameters:
  - owner: Repository owner (string, required)
  - repo: Repository name (string, required)
  - path: File or directory path (string, optional)
Get Repository Content for a Specific Branch Retrieves the content of a repository at a specific path for a given branch.
- Template: repo://{owner}/{repo}/refs/heads/{branch}/contents{/path*}
- Parameters:
  - owner: Repository owner (string, required)
  - repo: Repository name (string, required)
  - branch: Branch name (string, required)
  - path: File or directory path (string, optional)
Get Repository Content for a Specific Commit Retrieves the content of a repository at a specific path for a given commit.
- Template: repo://{owner}/{repo}/sha/{sha}/contents{/path*}
- Parameters:
  - owner: Repository owner (string, required)
  - repo: Repository name (string, required)
  - sha: Commit SHA (string, required)
  - path: File or directory path (string, optional)
Get Repository Content for a Specific Tag Retrieves the content of a repository at a specific path for a given tag.
- Template: repo://{owner}/{repo}/refs/tags/{tag}/contents{/path*}
- Parameters:
  - owner: Repository owner (string, required)
  - repo: Repository name (string, required)
  - tag: Tag name (string, required)
  - path: File or directory path (string, optional)
Get Repository Content for a Specific Pull Request Retrieves the content of a repository at a specific path for a given pull request.
- Template: repo://{owner}/{repo}/refs/pull/{prNumber}/head/contents{/path*}
- Parameters:
  - owner: Repository owner (string, required)
  - repo: Repository name (string, required)
  - prNumber: Pull request number (string, required)
  - path: File or directory path (string, optional)

Library Usage

The exported Go API of this module should currently be considered unstable, and subject to breaking changes. In the future, we may offer stability; please file an issue if there is a use case where this would be valuable.

License

This project is licensed under the terms of the MIT open source license. Please refer to MIT for the full terms.

License

codingoutloud/github-mcp-server

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