mcp-pdf-utils
MCP server for PDF manipulation. Merge, split, rotate, watermark, extract text, and more.
Works with Claude Desktop, Cursor, VS Code, ChatGPT, and any MCP-compatible client.
Why
PDF manipulation is one of the most common developer tasks, yet there's no good MCP server for it. The existing options have 1 star. This one actually works.
Everything runs locally. No API keys. No cloud services. Your PDFs never leave your machine.
Tools
| Tool | Description |
|---|---|
pdf_info | Get metadata, page count, file size |
pdf_extract_text | Extract text content from pages |
pdf_merge | Combine multiple PDFs into one |
pdf_split | Split PDF into individual page files |
pdf_extract_pages | Extract a page range into a new PDF |
pdf_rotate | Rotate pages by 90°, 180°, or 270° |
pdf_add_watermark | Add text watermark (e.g. DRAFT, CONFIDENTIAL) |
pdf_delete_pages | Remove specific pages |
pdf_reorder | Rearrange page order |
pdf_set_metadata | Set title, author, subject, keywords |
pdf_create | Create a new PDF from plain text |
Quick Start
Claude Desktop
Add to your claude_desktop_config.json:
{
"mcpServers": {
"pdf-tools": {
"command": "npx",
"args": ["-y", "mcp-pdf-utils"]
}
}
}
That's it. Restart Claude Desktop and start asking it to work with PDFs.
Claude Code
claude mcp add pdf-tools -- npx -y mcp-pdf-utils
Cursor
Add to your Cursor MCP settings:
{
"mcpServers": {
"pdf-tools": {
"command": "npx",
"args": ["-y", "mcp-pdf-utils"]
}
}
}
VS Code
Add to your VS Code MCP config:
{
"mcp": {
"servers": {
"pdf-tools": {
"command": "npx",
"args": ["-y", "mcp-pdf-utils"]
}
}
}
}
Usage Examples
Once connected, just talk to your AI naturally:
- "Merge invoice_jan.pdf and invoice_feb.pdf into combined.pdf"
- "Extract pages 3-7 from report.pdf"
- "Add a CONFIDENTIAL watermark to contract.pdf"
- "How many pages does presentation.pdf have?"
- "Rotate all pages in scan.pdf by 90 degrees"
- "Remove page 5 from my document"
- "Extract all the text from this PDF"
- "Reorder the pages: put page 3 first, then 1, then 2"
Development
git clone https://github.com/zekovdev/mcp-pdf-utils.git
cd mcp-pdf-utils
npm install
npm run dev
Test with MCP Inspector
npm run inspect
This opens the official MCP Inspector where you can test every tool visually.
How It Works
The server uses pdf-lib for PDF manipulation and pdf-parse for text extraction. Both run locally with zero external dependencies — no API keys, no network calls, no cloud services.
Communication uses the MCP stdio transport, meaning the server runs as a local process that your AI client spawns and talks to via stdin/stdout.
Roadmap
- PDF compression (reduce file size)
- Image extraction from PDFs
- PDF to images (page thumbnails)
- Add page numbers
- PDF encryption / password protection
- Fill PDF form fields
- OCR for scanned PDFs (via Tesseract)
- Image to PDF conversion
Contributing
PRs welcome. Run npm run inspect to test your changes before submitting.
License
MIT