Zotero MCP

🚀 Zotero MCP: Your Research Repository with Claude

Zotero MCP is a tool that connects Zotero with AI assistants like Claude, enabling you to access and manage your research materials via the MCP protocol.

✨ Features

Search Functions

• Search the Repository: Quickly find your literature resources.
• Advanced Search: Support complex query conditions to help you precisely locate the required content.
• Favorite Management: List and view all favorites and the literature they contain.
• Recent Updates: Get the literature recently added to the repository.

Content Access

• Metadata Retrieval: Obtain detailed information about the literature, such as title, author, and publication year.
• Full - text Acquisition: Read the full - text content of the literature directly when supported.
• Attachment Management: View all attachments and notes associated with the literature.

Annotation and Note Handling

• Annotation Extraction: Directly extract handwritten or text annotations from PDF files.
• Note Retrieval: Quickly access all notes you added in Zotero.
• Content Search: Conduct a full - text search in notes and annotations, including content extracted from PDFs.
• New Note Creation: Create new annotations for specific literature (testing feature).

Flexible Access Modes

• Local API Usage: Access the repository through Zotero's local service.
• Web API Integration: Support access to the repository on a remote server, requiring the corresponding API key and repository ID.

📦 Installation and Configuration Guide

Installation via Smithery

# Directly install and start the service
zotero-mcp setup

Manual Installation (uv Method)

1. Download the Source Code: Clone or download from the project repository.
2. Run the Installation Script:

   uv zotero-mcp run
   

3. Start the Service:

   zotero-mcp serve
   

Installation via pip

pip install zotero-mcp

🔧 Advanced Configuration

Use Web API Instead of Local API

zotero-mcp setup --no-local --api-key Your_API_Key --library-id Your_Repository_ID

Environment Variables

• ZOTERO_LOCAL=true: Use the local Zotero service (default is false).
• ZOTERO_API_KEY: Your Zotero Web API key.
• ZOTERO_LIBRARY_ID: The ID of the repository you want to access.
• ZOTERO_LIBRARY_TYPE: The type of the repository, with optional values of user or group (default is user).

Command - line Options

# Directly run the service
zotero-mcp serve

# Specify the transmission method
zotero-mcp serve --transport stdio|sse

# Get more setup help
zotero-mcp setup --help

💻 PDF Annotation Extraction Feature

Zotero MCP offers powerful PDF annotation processing capabilities, including:

• Direct PDF Parsing: Extract handwritten and text annotations from PDFs without relying on Zotero's indexing function.
• Enhanced Search: Conduct a full - text search in the annotation content.
• Image Annotation Support: Identify and extract image annotations in PDFs.
• Seamless Integration: Perfectly compatible with Zotero's native annotation system.

💡 Usage Tip

For the best experience, it is recommended to install the Zotero Better BibTeX plugin. This feature performs better in the plugin environment.

📚 Available Toolset

Search Tools

• zotero_search_items: Search for literature in the repository.
• zotero_advanced_search: Execute advanced and complex queries.
• zotero_get_collections: Get a list of all favorites.
• zotero_get_collection_items: View the literature in a specific favorite.
• zotero_get_tags: List all tags.
• zotero_get_recent: Get the recently added literature.

Content Access Tools

• zotero_get_metadata: Obtain detailed metadata of the literature.
• zotero_get_fulltext: Get the full - text content of the literature when supported.
• zotero_list_attachments: View the list of attachments associated with the literature.

Annotation Processing Tools

• zotero_extract_annotations: Extract annotation content from PDFs.
• zotero_search_notes: Conduct a full - text search in all notes and annotations.
• zotero_create_note: Create new annotations for specific literature.

🛠️ Troubleshooting and Support

If you encounter any problems, please visit the project's official website or join the user community for help:

• Project Homepage: https://github.com/yourusername/zotero-mcp
• User Forum: https://discussions.zotero.org

📄 License

This project follows the MIT open - source license. Please refer to the project's LICENSE file for specific terms.