Advanced GitLab MCP server

Advanced GitLab MCP server — 44 tools across 18 entity types with CQRS architecture, OAuth 2.1, and multiple transport modes.

Quick Start

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "gitlab": {
      "command": "npx",
      "args": ["-y", "@structured-world/gitlab-mcp"],
      "env": {
        "GITLAB_TOKEN": "your_gitlab_token",
        "GITLAB_API_URL": "https://gitlab.com"
      }
    }
  }
}

Requirements: Node.js >= 24

Highlights

• 44 tools across 18 entity types — projects, merge requests, pipelines, work items, wiki, and more
• CQRS architecture — browse_* for queries, manage_* for commands
• Connection resilience — Bounded startup, auto-reconnect with exponential backoff, disconnected mode when GitLab is unreachable
• Multi-instance support — Connect to multiple GitLab instances with per-instance OAuth and rate limiting
• Multiple transports — stdio, SSE, StreamableHTTP
• OAuth 2.1 — Per-user authentication via Claude Custom Connector
• Read-only mode — Safe operation for production environments
• Auto-discovery — Detects GitLab config from git remotes
• Fine-grained control — Enable/disable tool groups, filter actions, customize descriptions
• Docker support — ghcr.io/structured-world/gitlab-mcp:latest

Documentation

Full documentation is available at gitlab-mcp.sw.foundation

| Section | Description | |---------|-------------| | Installation | npm, Docker, VS Code, Codex | | Configuration | Environment variables, feature flags | | Multi-Instance | Connect to multiple GitLab instances | | Tool Reference | All 44 tools with parameters | | OAuth Setup | Team authentication with Claude | | TLS/HTTPS | Production deployment with SSL | | Customization | Tool descriptions, action filtering | | CLI Tools | Browse and export tool documentation |

Auto-generated Tool Reference

For the complete tool reference with parameters:

# View locally
yarn list-tools --detail

# Generate documentation
yarn list-tools --export --toc > docs/tools/api-reference.md

See the Full API Reference for the auto-generated tool documentation.

Docker

# HTTP mode
docker run -e PORT=3002 -e GITLAB_TOKEN=your_token -p 3333:3002 \
  ghcr.io/structured-world/gitlab-mcp:latest

# stdio mode
docker run -i --rm -e GITLAB_TOKEN=your_token \
  ghcr.io/structured-world/gitlab-mcp:latest

Connection Resilience

The server handles GitLab connectivity issues gracefully:

• Bounded startup — Server starts within GITLAB_INIT_TIMEOUT_MS (default 5s) regardless of GitLab availability
• Disconnected mode — When GitLab is unreachable (disconnected/failed state), only the manage_context tool is exposed, with local actions such as whoami, switch_profile, and set_scope for diagnostics. During active reconnect (connecting state), the full tool list remains available so MCP clients don't lose their tool catalog during brief outages. MCP clients are notified of tool availability changes via tools/list_changed
• Auto-reconnect — Exponential backoff reconnection (5s → 60s) with ±10% jitter
• Error classification — Transient errors (network, 5xx, timeouts) trigger auto-reconnect. Auth/config errors at startup transition to failed state (no auto-reconnect). Mid-session token revocation is detected via an authenticated HEAD /api/v4/user check that runs alongside each periodic health check (static token mode only; skipped in OAuth mode). A 401 or 403 on this check transitions the instance to failed state immediately.
• Instance health monitor — Each monitored instance URL has its own XState state machine. Untracked OAuth URLs currently pass through as reachable.

| Variable | Default | Description | |----------|---------|-------------| | GITLAB_INIT_TIMEOUT_MS | 5000 | Max time to wait for GitLab during startup | | GITLAB_RECONNECT_BASE_DELAY_MS | 5000 | Initial reconnect delay (doubles each attempt) | | GITLAB_RECONNECT_MAX_DELAY_MS | 60000 | Maximum reconnect delay | | GITLAB_HEALTH_CHECK_INTERVAL_MS | 60000 | Health check interval when connected | | GITLAB_FAILURE_THRESHOLD | 3 | Consecutive transient failures before disconnecting | | GITLAB_TOOL_TIMEOUT_MS | 120000 | Max time for tool/bootstrap execution before timeout | | GITLAB_RESPONSE_WRITE_TIMEOUT_MS | 10000 | Max time to flush a non-SSE response before destroying zombie connection (0 to disable; SSE uses heartbeat) | | GITLAB_INSTANCE_CACHE_MAX | 100 | Max number of per-URL instance states kept in memory (OAuth multi-tenant; LRU eviction when exceeded) | | GITLAB_INSTANCE_TTL_MS | 3600000 | TTL for idle per-URL instance states in ms; evicted on next insert (OAuth multi-tenant) |

Feature Flags

| Flag | Default | Tools Enabled | |------|---------|---------------| | USE_LABELS | true | Label management | | USE_MRS | true | Merge requests | | USE_FILES | true | File operations | | USE_VARIABLES | true | CI/CD variables | | USE_WORKITEMS | true | Issues, epics, tasks | | USE_WEBHOOKS | true | Webhook management | | USE_SNIPPETS | true | Code snippets | | USE_INTEGRATIONS | true | 50+ integrations | | USE_GITLAB_WIKI | true | Wiki pages | | USE_MILESTONE | true | Milestones | | USE_PIPELINE | true | Pipelines & CI/CD | | USE_RELEASES | true | Release management | | USE_REFS | true | Branch & tag management | | USE_MEMBERS | true | Team members | | USE_SEARCH | true | Cross-project search | | USE_ITERATIONS | true | Iteration planning (sprints) |

Contributing

See CONTRIBUTING.md for development setup, testing, and PR guidelines.

Support the Project

USDT (TRC-20): TFDsezHa1cBkoeZT5q2T49Wp66K8t2DmdA

License

Apache License 2.0 — see LICENSE for details.

Based on zereight/gitlab-mcp (MIT). See LICENSE.MIT.