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Launch RAGFlow MCP server

Launch an MCP server from source or via Docker.

A RAGFlow Model Context Protocol (MCP) server is designed as an independent component to complement the RAGFlow server. Note that an MCP server must operate alongside a properly functioning RAGFlow server.

An MCP server can start up in either self-host mode (default) or host mode:

Self-host mode:
When launching an MCP server in self-host mode, you must provide an API key to authenticate the MCP server with the RAGFlow server. In this mode, the MCP server can access only the datasets (knowledge bases) of a specified tenant on the RAGFlow server.
Host mode:
In host mode, each MCP client can access their own knowledge bases on the RAGFlow server. However, each client request must include a valid API key to authenticate the client with the RAGFlow server.

Once a connection is established, an MCP server communicates with its client in MCP HTTP+SSE (Server-Sent Events) mode, unidirectionally pushing responses from the RAGFlow server to its client in real time.

Prerequisites

Ensure RAGFlow is upgraded to v0.18.0 or later.
Have your RAGFlow API key ready. See Acquire a RAGFlow API key.

:::tip INFO If you wish to try out our MCP server without upgrading RAGFlow, community contributor yiminghub2024 👏 shares their recommended steps here. :::

Launch an MCP server

You can start an MCP server either from source code or via Docker.

Launch from source code

Ensure that a RAGFlow server v0.18.0+ is properly running.
Launch the MCP server:

# Launch the MCP server to work in self-host mode, run either of the following
uv run mcp/server/server.py --host=127.0.0.1 --port=9382 --base_url=http://127.0.0.1:9380 --api_key=ragflow-xxxxx
# uv run mcp/server/server.py --host=127.0.0.1 --port=9382 --base_url=http://127.0.0.1:9380 --mode=self-host --api_key=ragflow-xxxxx

# To launch the MCP server to work in host mode, run the following instead:
# uv run mcp/server/server.py --host=127.0.0.1 --port=9382 --base_url=http://127.0.0.1:9380 --mode=host

Where:

host: The MCP server’s host address.
port: The MCP server’s listening port.
base_url: The address of the running RAGFlow server.
mode: The launch mode.
- self-host: (default) self-host mode.
- host: host mode.
api_key: Required in self-host mode to authenticate the MCP server with the RAGFlow server.

Launch from Docker

1. Enable MCP server

The MCP server is designed as an optional component that complements the RAGFlow server and disabled by default. To enable MCP server:

Navigate to docker/docker-compose.yml.
Uncomment the services.ragflow.command section as shown below:

  services:
    ragflow:
      ...
      image: ${RAGFLOW_IMAGE}
      # Example configuration to set up an MCP server:
      command:
        - --enable-mcpserver
        - --mcp-host=0.0.0.0
        - --mcp-port=9382
        - --mcp-base-url=http://127.0.0.1:9380
        - --mcp-script-path=/ragflow/mcp/server/server.py
        - --mcp-mode=self-host
        - --mcp-host-api-key=ragflow-xxxxxxx

Where:

mcp-host: The MCP server’s host address.
mcp-port: The MCP server’s listening port.
mcp-base_url: The address of the running RAGFlow server.
mcp-script-path: The file path to the MCP server’s main script.
mcp-mode: The launch mode.
- self-host: (default) self-host mode.
- host: host mode.
mcp-host-api_key: Required in self-host mode to authenticate the MCP server with the RAGFlow server.

2. Launch a RAGFlow server with an MCP server

Run docker compose -f docker-compose.yml to launch the RAGFlow server together with the MCP server.

The following ASCII art confirms a successful launch:

  ragflow-server  | Starting MCP Server on 0.0.0.0:9382 with base URL http://127.0.0.1:9380...
  ragflow-server  | Starting 1 task executor(s) on host 'dd0b5e07e76f'...
  ragflow-server  | 2025-04-18 15:41:18,816 INFO     27 ragflow_server log path: /ragflow/logs/ragflow_server.log, log levels: {'peewee': 'WARNING', 'pdfminer': 'WARNING', 'root': 'INFO'}
  ragflow-server  | 
  ragflow-server  | __  __  ____ ____       ____  _____ ______     _______ ____
  ragflow-server  | |  \/  |/ ___|  _ \     / ___|| ____|  _ \ \   / / ____|  _ \
  ragflow-server  | | |\/| | |   | |_) |    \___ \|  _| | |_) \ \ / /|  _| | |_) |
  ragflow-server  | | |  | | |___|  __/      ___) | |___|  _ < \ V / | |___|  _ <
  ragflow-server  | |_|  |_|\____|_|        |____/|_____|_| \_\ \_/  |_____|_| \_\
  ragflow-server  |     
  ragflow-server  | MCP launch mode: self-host
  ragflow-server  | MCP host: 0.0.0.0
  ragflow-server  | MCP port: 9382
  ragflow-server  | MCP base_url: http://127.0.0.1:9380
  ragflow-server  | INFO:     Started server process [26]
  ragflow-server  | INFO:     Waiting for application startup.
  ragflow-server  | INFO:     Application startup complete.
  ragflow-server  | INFO:     Uvicorn running on http://0.0.0.0:9382 (Press CTRL+C to quit)
  ragflow-server  | 2025-04-18 15:41:20,469 INFO     27 found 0 gpus
  ragflow-server  | 2025-04-18 15:41:23,263 INFO     27 init database on cluster mode successfully
  ragflow-server  | 2025-04-18 15:41:25,318 INFO     27 load_model /ragflow/rag/res/deepdoc/det.onnx uses CPU
  ragflow-server  | 2025-04-18 15:41:25,367 INFO     27 load_model /ragflow/rag/res/deepdoc/rec.onnx uses CPU
  ragflow-server  |         ____   ___    ______ ______ __               
  ragflow-server  |        / __ \ /   |  / ____// ____// /____  _      __
  ragflow-server  |       / /_/ // /| | / / __ / /_   / // __ \| | /| / /
  ragflow-server  |      / _, _// ___ |/ /_/ // __/  / // /_/ /| |/ |/ / 
  ragflow-server  |     /_/ |_|/_/  |_|\____//_/    /_/ \____/ |__/|__/                             
  ragflow-server  | 
  ragflow-server  |     
  ragflow-server  | 2025-04-18 15:41:29,088 INFO     27 RAGFlow version: v0.18.0-285-gb2c299fa full
  ragflow-server  | 2025-04-18 15:41:29,088 INFO     27 project base: /ragflow
  ragflow-server  | 2025-04-18 15:41:29,088 INFO     27 Current configs, from /ragflow/conf/service_conf.yaml:
  ragflow-server  |  ragflow: {'host': '0.0.0.0', 'http_port': 9380}
  ...
  ragflow-server  |  * Running on all addresses (0.0.0.0)
  ragflow-server  |  * Running on http://127.0.0.1:9380
  ragflow-server  |  * Running on http://172.19.0.6:9380
  ragflow-server  |   ______           __      ______                     __            
  ragflow-server  |  /_  __/___ ______/ /__   / ____/  _____  _______  __/ /_____  _____
  ragflow-server  |   / / / __ `/ ___/ //_/  / __/ | |/_/ _ \/ ___/ / / / __/ __ \/ ___/
  ragflow-server  |  / / / /_/ (__  ) ,<    / /____>  </  __/ /__/ /_/ / /_/ /_/ / /    
  ragflow-server  | /_/  \__,_/____/_/|_|  /_____/_/|_|\___/\___/\__,_/\__/\____/_/                               
  ragflow-server  |     
  ragflow-server  | 2025-04-18 15:41:34,501 INFO     32 TaskExecutor: RAGFlow version: v0.18.0-285-gb2c299fa full
  ragflow-server  | 2025-04-18 15:41:34,501 INFO     32 Use Elasticsearch http://es01:9200 as the doc engine.
  ...

Launch an MCP server without upgrading RAGFlow

:::info KUDOS This section is contributed by our community contributor yiminghub2024. 👏 :::

Prepare all MCP-specific files and directories.
i. Copy the mcp/ directory to your local working directory.
ii. Copy docker/docker-compose.yml locally.
iii. Copy docker/entrypoint.sh locally.
iv. Install the required dependencies using uv:
- Run uv add mcp or
- Copy pyproject.toml locally and run uv sync --python 3.10 --all-extras.
Edit docker-compose.yml to enable MCP (disabled by default).
Launch the MCP server:

docker compose -f docker-compose.yml up -d`

Check MCP server status

Run the following to check the logs the RAGFlow server and the MCP server:

docker logs ragflow-server

Security considerations

As MCP technology is still at early stage and no official best practices for authentication or authorization have been established, RAGFlow currently uses API key to validate identity for the operations described earlier. However, in public environments, this makeshift solution could expose your MCP server to potential network attacks. Therefore, when running a local SSE server, it is recommended to bind only to localhost (127.0.0.1) rather than to all interfaces (0.0.0.0).

For further guidance, see the official MCP documentation.

Frequently asked questions

When to use an API key for authentication?

The use of an API key depends on the operating mode of your MCP server.

Self-host mode (default):
When starting the MCP server in self-host mode, you should provide an API key when launching it to authenticate it with the RAGFlow server:
- If launching from source, include the API key in the command.
- If launching from Docker, update the API key in docker/docker-compose.yml.
Host mode:
If your RAGFlow MCP server is working in host mode, include the API key in the headers of your client requests to authenticate your client with the RAGFlow server. An example is available here.

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