MCP Email Reader

Overview

The Mcp Email Reader is an MCP server that bridges email inboxes to AI assistants such as Claude Desktop or LibreChat. By exposing three specialized tools—, , and —the server allows an assistant to query, retrieve, and organize messages directly from a user’s mailbox. This eliminates the need for manual email handling or separate scripts, enabling seamless integration of email data into AI‑driven workflows.

Solving a Common Pain Point

Developers often need to pull contextual information from email—such as recent correspondence, meeting details, or attached documents—to answer user queries or automate tasks. Traditionally this requires writing custom IMAP clients, handling authentication securely, and parsing email formats. The Mcp Email Reader abstracts these complexities behind a clean MCP interface, providing ready‑to‑use tools that accept simple parameters and return structured results. This reduces boilerplate code, speeds up prototype development, and lowers the barrier for non‑technical users to leverage email data.

What It Does

• : Executes an IMAP search using user‑defined criteria (subject, sender, date ranges). The tool returns a list of matching message IDs and brief metadata, allowing the assistant to surface relevant conversations without downloading full payloads.
• : Given a message ID and attachment index, this tool retrieves the file content as a base64‑encoded string. It can be used to feed documents into document‑analysis models or store attachments locally.
• : Enumerates all mailbox folders, supporting hierarchical structures. This helps assistants guide users through folder navigation or automate organization tasks.

Each tool is stateless and relies on environment variables for secure IMAP credentials, ensuring that sensitive data remains protected while still being accessible to the assistant.

Key Features & Advantages

• Secure Credential Handling: Credentials are passed via environment variables, with an optional encryption key for password protection. This keeps secrets out of source code and version control.
• MCP‑Ready: The server follows MCP conventions, making it plug‑and‑play with any MCP‑enabled client. No custom adapters are required.
• Lightweight Deployment: Powered by , the server can be launched on demand from a GitHub URL, reducing local installation overhead.
• Cross‑Platform Compatibility: Tested on Windows and macOS with popular AI tools, ensuring broad usability across developer environments.

Real‑World Use Cases

• Contextual Email Summaries: An assistant can pull recent emails about a project, summarize them, and present insights to a user during a chat session.
• Automated Document Retrieval: By downloading attachments on demand, the assistant can feed PDFs or spreadsheets into downstream NLP pipelines for analysis.
• Inbox Management: The tool can help users create or reorganize folders through conversational commands, improving email organization without leaving the chat interface.
• Compliance Audits: Automated searches for specific keywords or dates can support regulatory reviews, pulling evidence directly into an audit report.

Integration with AI Workflows

Developers embed the server’s tools in their MCP client configuration, then invoke them via natural language prompts. For example, a user might ask the assistant to “find all emails from John last month with PDF attachments,” and the assistant would translate that request into a call followed by selective actions. The returned data can be passed to other models for summarization, sentiment analysis, or action planning, creating a fully automated end‑to‑end pipeline that starts and ends in the conversational UI.

In summary, the Mcp Email Reader turns a traditional email inbox into an AI‑friendly data source, enabling developers to build richer, context-aware applications without wrestling with low‑level IMAP details.