Zotero MCP, the community server for your Zotero library

• Finds papers in your library by topic or meaning, not just exact words

  Searches your library by meaning using an index of your papers, so a question like 'papers on mindfulness therapy' finds relevant items even when the words differ. Needs the semantic search add-on and an index built first.

  Try: “Find papers in my library about how attention replaced recurrence in language models”

  Read · zotero_semantic_search

• Searches your library by title, author, year or abstract text

  Looks up items whose title, authors, year or abstract contain the words you give it. Works best with short queries like an author and a year.

  Try: “Find the Brewer 2011 paper in my Zotero library”

  Read · zotero_search_items

• Filters your library by several fields at once, like date range and item type

  Runs a structured search that combines conditions on fields such as date, item type or publication, joined by AND or OR.

  Try: “Show journal articles in my library published between 2018 and 2020 about sleep”

  Read · zotero_advanced_search

• Finds items with certain tags, with OR and exclude options

  Lists items carrying the tags you name. You can combine tags, accept either of two tags, or exclude a tag.

  Try: “Show papers tagged methods or methodology but not draft”

  Read · zotero_search_by_tag

• Looks up one item by its Better BibTeX citation key

  Finds the single item that has the citation key you give it, as assigned by the Better BibTeX plugin, and returns its details.

  Try: “Look up Smith2024 in my library”

  Read · zotero_search_by_citation_key

• Lists the items you added most recently

  Shows the newest additions to your library, optionally within one collection. Good for 'what did I save this week?'.

  Try: “What papers did I add to Zotero this week?”

  Read · zotero_get_recent

• Shows full details for one item: authors, date, DOI, abstract, tags

  Fetches the complete record for one item, including title, authors, date, DOI, publisher, tags and abstract. Can also return it as BibTeX.

  Try: “Give me the BibTeX entry for the Vaswani 2017 paper”

  Read · zotero_get_item_metadata

• Reads the full text of a saved paper's PDF or EPUB

  Returns the extracted text of an item's main PDF or EPUB so the assistant can read the whole paper. Long papers use a lot of context.

  Try: “Read this paper and summarize its key findings”

  Read · zotero_get_item_fulltext

• Reads chosen pages of a PDF, as text or as page images

  Reads a page range of a paper's PDF as text, and flags pages where math, figures or tables come out garbled. It can return those pages as images instead.

  Try: “Read pages 4 to 6 of the attention paper and explain the equation on page 4”

  Read · zotero_read_pdf_pages

• Shows a PDF's table of contents with page numbers

  Pulls the outline or bookmarks from a PDF so the assistant can find the right section before reading the full text.

  Try: “Show me the table of contents of this book chapter PDF”

  Read · zotero_get_pdf_outline

• Shows all your collections and subcollections as a tree

  Lists every collection in the active library, with nested subcollections, so you can see how your library is organized.

  Try: “Show me how my Zotero collections are organized”

  Read · zotero_get_collections

• Finds a collection by name

  Searches collection names in the active library and returns the matching collections.

  Try: “Find my collection called Thesis chapter 2”

  Read · zotero_search_collections

• Lists the items in one collection

  Shows every item filed in a collection, with or without abstracts, and optionally items in its subcollections too.

  Try: “List everything in my Literature Review collection”

  Read · zotero_get_collection_items

• Lists every tag used in your library

  Returns all the tags in the active library, useful before filtering or retagging items.

  Try: “What tags do I use in my library?”

  Read · zotero_get_tags

• Lists an item's attachments, notes and annotations

  Shows the files, notes and annotations attached to one or more items, such as which PDF belongs to a paper.

  Try: “What files and notes are attached to this paper?”

  Read · zotero_get_item_children

• Pulls the highlights and comments from a paper's PDF

  Collects highlights and attached comments from a paper's PDF or EPUB, or across the library.

  Try: “Show all my highlights from the Devlin 2019 paper”

  Read · zotero_get_annotations

• Lists your notes, or searches note and annotation text

  Lists notes for one item or the whole library, or searches the text of your notes and annotations for a phrase.

  Try: “Search my notes for reinforcement learning”

  Read · zotero_get_notes

• Gathers highlights and notes across papers into one digest per paper

  Collects every highlight, comment and note within a collection or set of papers and groups them by paper, so the assistant can write a literature summary from them.

  Try: “Gather my highlights and notes from the Sleep collection so you can write a summary”

  Read · zotero_synthesize_annotations

• Formats a bibliography or in-text citations in a citation style

  Uses Zotero's own citation engine to produce a formatted reference list or in-text citations for chosen items or a collection, ready to paste into a manuscript.

  Try: “Make an APA bibliography of everything in my Chapter 3 collection”

  Read · zotero_export_bibliography

• Shows items you linked as related to a paper

  Lists the items linked to one item through Zotero's related items field.

  Try: “Which items are marked as related to this preprint?”

  Read · zotero_get_item_related

• Finds papers a work cites and papers that cite it, via OpenAlex

  Follows a paper's citation trail in OpenAlex, a free scholarly index, to find what it cites and newer work citing it, and marks which ones are already in your library.

  Try: “Find newer papers that cite this one and are not in my library yet”

  Network · zotero_find_related_papers

• Shows which items are missing a PDF

  Checks your library or one collection for items with and without a downloaded PDF, listing DOIs for the missing ones.

  Try: “Which papers in my Thesis collection have no PDF?”

  Read · zotero_library_coverage

• Shows how often a paper is supported or disputed, and any retraction

  Fetches a Scite citation report for one paper: how many later works support, contrast or mention it, plus retraction or correction notices.

  Try: “Has this paper been retracted, and how is it cited?”

  Network · scite_enrich_item

• Searches your library and adds Scite citation counts to each result

  Runs a library search and adds Scite's supporting, contrasting and mentioning counts and any notices to every result.

  Try: “Search my library for CRISPR papers and show how each is cited”

  Network · scite_enrich_search

• Checks your papers for retractions and corrections

  Scans items in your library against Scite for retractions, corrections and expressions of concern, and lists only the flagged ones.

  Try: “Check my reading list for any retracted papers”

  Network · scite_check_retractions

• Lists your personal and group libraries

  Shows every library it can reach, your own and group libraries, with item counts.

  Try: “Which Zotero libraries can you see?”

  Read · zotero_list_libraries

• Switches which library the assistant works in

  Sets the active library, personal or a group, for every later search and edit in the session.

  Try: “Switch to my lab's group library”

  Read · zotero_switch_library

• Lists your Zotero RSS feed subscriptions

  Shows the RSS feeds subscribed in your Zotero desktop app, with item counts and when each was last checked.

  Try: “Which RSS feeds do I follow in Zotero?”

  Read · zotero_list_feeds

• Shows recent items from one RSS feed

  Fetches the latest titles, authors and links from one of your Zotero RSS feeds.

  Try: “What is new in my Nature feed?”

  Read · zotero_get_feed_items

• Adds papers by DOI, URL, ISBN, BibTeX or a PDF file, with open PDFs

  Creates new items from a DOI, web address, ISBN, BibTeX, CSL JSON or a local file, can file them into collections, and attaches an open-access PDF when one exists.

  Try: “Add 10.48550/arXiv.1706.03762 to my Transformers collection”

  Write · zotero_add_item

• Edits an item's details, like title, date, DOI or tags

  Changes the metadata fields you name on an existing item and leaves the rest as is.

  Try: “Fix the publication year on this item to 2019”

  Write · zotero_update_item

• Adds or removes tags on many items at once

  Edits many items in one go: adds or removes tags and edits lines in the Extra field, selecting items by key, search or tag.

  Try: “Tag every paper in my search results about sleep with to-read”

  Write · zotero_batch_update

• Highlights text, boxes a figure or adds a sticky note in a PDF

  Adds a highlight on exact words, an area box over a figure or table, or a sticky note at a spot in a PDF.

  Try: “Highlight the main claims in this paper and box its key figures”

  Write · zotero_create_annotation

• Changes an annotation's comment, color or tags

  Edits an existing highlight or note annotation: its text, comment, color or tags.

  Try: “Change my yellow highlights on page 3 to red”

  Write · zotero_update_annotation

• Creates, edits or trashes a note on an item

  Writes a new note on an item, changes an existing note, or moves a note to the Trash.

  Try: “Add a note to this paper summarizing its method”

  Delete · zotero_manage_note

• Creates a new collection or subcollection

  Makes a new collection, optionally inside an existing one.

  Try: “Create a collection called Chapter 4 under Thesis”

  Write · zotero_create_collection

• Renames a collection or moves it under another

  Renames a collection or moves it to a new parent while keeping its items and subcollections.

  Try: “Rename my Misc collection to Background reading”

  Write · zotero_update_collection

• Adds items to or removes them from collections

  Changes which collections existing items are filed in, without creating new collections.

  Try: “Move these five papers into my Methods collection”

  Write · zotero_set_item_collections

• Moves an attachment or note under a different item

  Sets, changes or clears the parent item of an attachment or note.

  Try: “Attach this loose PDF to the right paper”

  Write · zotero_set_item_parent

• Attaches a file or PDF link to an item you already have

  Uploads a local file or a PDF from a web address as an attachment to an existing item.

  Try: “Attach this PDF I downloaded to the Smith 2024 item”

  Write · zotero_attach_file

• Links two items as related

  Creates a two-way related link between two items, for example a preprint and its published version.

  Try: “Mark the preprint and the journal version of this paper as related”

  Write · zotero_add_item_relation

• Removes a related link between two items

  Deletes the related-items link between two items.

  Try: “Unlink these two papers”

  Delete · zotero_remove_item_relation

• Finds duplicate items in your library

  Scans the library or a collection for items that look like duplicates and lists them for review without changing anything.

  Try: “Find duplicate papers in my library”

  Read · zotero_find_duplicates

• Merges duplicate items into one and trashes the extras

  Moves tags, notes, annotations and attachments onto the item you keep and sends the duplicates to the Trash. Shows a preview first unless you confirm.

  Try: “Merge the duplicate copies of the BERT paper”

  Delete · zotero_merge_duplicates

• Moves an item to Zotero's Trash

  Sends an item to the Trash, where you can still restore it until you empty the Trash.

  Try: “Delete the blank test item I added”

  Delete · zotero_delete_item

• Deletes a collection and its subcollections, not the items in it

  Removes a collection and its subcollections for good. The items inside stay in your library.

  Try: “Delete my Old drafts collection”

  Delete · zotero_delete_collection

• Permanently deletes an annotation

  Removes a highlight or other annotation outright; it cannot be undone.

  Try: “Delete the highlight I just made on page 2”

  Delete · zotero_delete_annotation

• Used by the assistant behind the scenes

  Finds where figures and tables sit on a PDF page

  Detects figure, table and equation regions on a page so area boxes land on the right spot.

  Try: “Find the figures on page 5 so you can box them”

  Read · zotero_get_page_layout

• Finds where an attachment's file is stored on your computer

  Returns the local file path of an item's attachments, so the assistant can open a large PDF directly. Local mode only.

  Try: “Where is the PDF for this book saved on my computer?”

  Files · zotero_get_attachment_path

• Checks whether it can save changes to your library, and how

  Reports whether writes go through the local Zotero app, the web API, both or neither, and what to do if none works.

  Try: “Can you make changes to my Zotero library?”

  Read · zotero_write_capabilities

• Asks Zotero to let it save changes; you approve in a dialog

  Opens a dialog in the Zotero app asking you to allow writes to your local library. Nothing changes until you click Allow.

  Try: “Ask Zotero for permission to add items”

  Write · zotero_authorize_local_writes

• Builds or refreshes the index used for search by meaning

  Indexes new or changed items for semantic search; run it after first install or after adding papers.

  Try: “Update the search index with the papers I added today”

  Write · zotero_update_search_database

• Checks whether search by meaning is ready

  Reports how many items are indexed, when it was last updated and which embedding model it uses.

  Try: “Is semantic search set up?”

  Read · zotero_get_search_database_status

• Search step ChatGPT uses for deep research

  A search endpoint ChatGPT needs for its connectors; other assistants use the regular library search instead.

  Try: “Search my Zotero library for climate papers (ChatGPT deep research)”

  Read · search

• Fetch step ChatGPT uses to read a result

  A fetch endpoint ChatGPT needs to read one search result; other assistants use the regular read tools instead.

  Try: “Open that result (ChatGPT deep research)”

  Read · fetch

Watch out for

• It can delete annotations and collections

  With writes on, it can permanently delete annotations and collections and move items and notes to the Trash. Leave writes off unless you need them. github.com

• The ChatGPT setup has no password

  Anyone with the tunnel address can use every tool. Stop the tunnel when you are done and never share its address. github.com

• Your papers are sent to the AI service

  Whatever the assistant reads from your library goes to that AI provider. OpenAI or Gemini search indexing also sends your text to them. github.com

• One shared web server shares the library choice

  If several clients use one HTTP server, switching libraries in one changes it for all. Run one server per person. github.com

• The write approval is saved on your computer

  Revoke it with the authorize-local revoke command and with Clear Write Authorizations in Zotero's Advanced settings. github.com

Security advisories

In their words