MCP Server for TiDB: Give Claude Direct Database Access

Stop copying and pasting query results into Claude. This MCP server connects Claude Desktop directly to your TiDB database, turning your AI assistant into a data analysis powerhouse that can explore schemas, debug queries, and analyze datasets in real-time.

Why Your TiDB Workflow Needs This

If you're building with TiDB (or any MySQL-compatible database), you know the drill: run a query in your terminal, copy the results, paste them into Claude, ask your question, repeat. It's tedious and breaks your flow.

This MCP server eliminates that friction entirely. Claude gets direct read/write access to your TiDB cluster and can:

• Explore your schema dynamically - "Show me all tables with user data" becomes a natural conversation
• Debug complex queries - Claude can inspect your actual data structure and suggest optimizations
• Analyze datasets on demand - "What's the distribution of user signups by month?" gets answered with real queries
• Generate reports directly - Claude builds and executes the SQL, formats the results

Perfect for TiDB Serverless Users

TiDB's serverless architecture pairs beautifully with this MCP server. You get:

• Zero connection management - The server handles TiDB's connection pooling automatically
• Instant scaling - Works whether you're querying 100 rows or 100 million
• Cost-effective exploration - Pay only for what Claude actually queries, not idle connections

Real-World Applications

Schema Discovery: "Claude, what foreign key relationships exist between my user and order tables?" Claude queries INFORMATION_SCHEMA and maps out your relationships visually.

Performance Analysis: Upload slow query logs and ask Claude to identify bottlenecks. It can query your actual table statistics and suggest index improvements.

Data Quality Audits: "Find anomalies in last month's transaction data." Claude writes the exploratory queries and surfaces outliers automatically.

Report Generation: "Create a monthly revenue breakdown by product category." Claude queries your data, calculates the metrics, and formats a presentation-ready summary.

Quick Integration

The setup is straightforward - grab your TiDB connection details from TiDB Cloud, add them to your environment, and configure Claude Desktop:

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "tidb": {
      "command": "uv",
      "args": [
        "--directory", "/path/to/mcp-server-tidb",
        "run", "src/main.py"
      ]
    }
  }
}

Your TiDB credentials live in environment variables, keeping them secure and separate from your Claude configuration.

Built for Production Workflows

This isn't a toy - it's designed for real development workflows:

• Environment isolation - Configure different TiDB clusters for dev, staging, and prod
• WSL compatibility - Works seamlessly if you're running TiDB tools in Windows Subsystem for Linux
• Secure by default - Database credentials never touch Claude's servers, staying in your local environment

The server speaks TiDB's native MySQL protocol, so it works with all TiDB features: HTAP workloads, distributed transactions, and TiDB's analytical engine.

Get Started Now

1. Clone the repo and install with uv
2. Set your TiDB connection variables (grab them from TiDB Cloud console)
3. Add the server to your Claude Desktop config
4. Start having database conversations that actually query your real data

Stop context-switching between your database tools and Claude. Make your AI assistant a first-class member of your data team.