sqldb-mcp-server

A read-only Model Context Protocol (MCP) server that exposes SQL database access to LLMs.

Features

• Multi-database – supports MSSQL, PostgreSQL, and MySQL
• Read-only – only SELECT statements are allowed (enforced via AST-level SQL parsing with the correct dialect per DB type)
• LLM-optimised – results use a compact columnar format (column list + value rows) to reduce token usage
• Pagination – skip / take parameters with automatic cap at 100 rows
• Total-count aware – every query result includes meta.totalCount so the LLM knows how many rows exist
• Caching – query / schema results are cached with a configurable TTL
• File export – stream query results to CSV or JSON files without a row-count limit
• Five MCP tools: query, listTables, describeTable, explainQuery, exportQuery

Installation

From npm (recommended)

# Install globally
npm install -g @akrym1582/sqldb-mcp-server

# Or run directly with npx (no install needed)
npx @akrym1582/sqldb-mcp-server

From source

git clone https://github.com/akrym1582/sqldb-mcp-server.git
cd sqldb-mcp-server
npm install
npm run build

Quick Start

# 1. Install globally
npm install -g @akrym1582/sqldb-mcp-server

# 2. Configure environment variables (see below)
export DB_TYPE=postgresql
export DB_HOST=localhost
export DB_USER=myuser
export DB_PASSWORD=mypassword
export DB_NAME=mydb

# 3. Run
sqldb-mcp-server

Or use in your MCP client configuration (e.g. Claude Desktop claude_desktop_config.json):

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "sqldb": {
      "command": "npx",
      "args": ["-y", "@akrym1582/sqldb-mcp-server"],
      "env": {
        "DB_TYPE": "postgresql",
        "DB_HOST": "localhost",
        "DB_PORT": "5432",
        "DB_USER": "myuser",
        "DB_PASSWORD": "mypassword",
        "DB_NAME": "mydb"
      }
    }
  }
}

Environment Variables

Default ports by DB type

MCP Tools

query

Execute a SELECT SQL statement.

{
  "sql": "SELECT id, name FROM users WHERE active = 1",
  "skip": 0,
  "take": 10
}

Response format (compact / token-efficient):

{
  "meta": { "totalCount": 42, "returnedCount": 10, "skip": 0, "take": 10 },
  "columns": ["id", "name"],
  "rows": [[1, "Alice"], [2, "Bob"], ...]
}

listTables

List all base tables in the database.

[{ "schema": "dbo", "name": "users" }, ...]

describeTable

Describe a table's columns, indexes, foreign keys, check constraints, and size statistics.

{ "table": "dbo.users" }

explainQuery

Return the estimated execution plan for a SELECT query without executing it.

{ "sql": "SELECT * FROM orders WHERE status = 'open'" }

exportQuery

Stream a SELECT query result to a file. Designed for large datasets – there is no row-count limit and results are written directly to disk using Node.js streams.

{
  "sql": "SELECT * FROM large_table",
  "filepath": "/tmp/export.csv",
  "format": "csv",
  "options": { "delimiter": ",", "bom": false }
}

format defaults to "csv" if omitted. "json" is also supported.

CSV options (all optional):

JSON options (all optional):

Response format:

{
  "filepath": "/tmp/export.csv",
  "format": "csv",
  "rowCount": 50000
}

The tool uses a separate, longer-lived connection pool whose requestTimeout is controlled by EXPORT_QUERY_TIMEOUT (default 300 000 ms = 5 min). Increase this value for very large exports.

Development

# Clone the repository
git clone https://github.com/akrym1582/sqldb-mcp-server.git
cd sqldb-mcp-server

# Install dependencies
npm install

# Configure environment
cp .env.example .env
# Edit .env with your DB credentials

# Run in dev mode (no compile step)
npm run dev

# Or build and run
npm run build
npm start

# Run unit tests
npm test

Project Structure

src/
  mcp/
    server.ts           # MCP server entry point
    tools/
      query.ts          # query tool
      listTables.ts     # listTables tool
      describeTable.ts  # describeTable tool
      explainQuery.ts   # explainQuery tool
      exportQuery.ts    # exportQuery tool (streaming file export)
  db/
    index.ts            # DB adapter factory (selects adapter from DB_TYPE)
    types.ts            # DB interfaces (including queryStream)
    adapters/
      mssql.ts          # Microsoft SQL Server implementation
      postgresql.ts     # PostgreSQL implementation (pg + pg-cursor)
      mysql.ts          # MySQL implementation (mysql2)
  utils/
    row-result.ts       # Compact columnar result format
    sanitize.ts         # AST-based SQL read-only validation (dialect-aware)
    pagination.ts       # skip/take normalisation
    cache.ts            # TTL in-memory cache
    export-writer.ts    # Streaming CSV / JSON file writer
  __tests__/            # Unit tests