How to Connect Gmail to Cursor via MCP

💡 No install? Use cloud.anythingmcp.com directly. Sign in, click Connectors → Gmail, paste your credentials, mint an MCP API key and you're done. No Docker, no git clone, no local server.

Gmail + Cursor

Let your AI work in Gmail: search the mailbox with Gmail's own search syntax, read messages and conversations, mark mail as read, archive, star or label it, and write, reply to or send email, or save a draft for you to check first. Personal Gmail and Google Workspace, with your own Google OAuth client.

Prerequisites

See the full setup instructions baked into the connector (visible in the in-app store when you select the connector). The required environment variables for this connector are:

GOOGLE_CLIENT_ID, GOOGLE_CLIENT_SECRET

Step 1 — Get credentials

1. Open console.cloud.google.com, pick or create a project, then go to APIs & Services → Library and enable the Gmail API.
2. Open APIs & Services → OAuth consent screen. Choose Internal if the mailbox is on Google Workspace (the simplest option), otherwise External. For External, set the publishing status to In production: while the app is in Testing, Google revokes its refresh tokens after 7 days and the connector stops working every week.
3. Open APIs & Services → Credentials → Create credentials → OAuth client ID, choose the application type Web application and add the authorized redirect URI https://cloud.anythingmcp.com/api/mcp-oauth/callback. If you host AnythingMCP yourself, enter https://your-anythingmcp-host/api/mcp-oauth/callback instead.
4. Paste the client ID into GOOGLE_CLIENT_ID and the client secret into GOOGLE_CLIENT_SECRET, then install the connector.
5. On the connector page, click Authorize with Provider and sign in with the Gmail account the AI should work with. The refresh token is stored encrypted and access tokens are renewed automatically.
6. Ask the AI to run gmail_get_profile: it returns the address the connector works as and how many messages and threads the mailbox holds.

One Google client for all Google connectors: the same Cloud project and OAuth client can serve every Google connector: Gmail, Google Calendar, Google Drive, Google Sheets, Google Docs, Google Tasks, Search Console, Analytics and Ads. Enable each API in that project, reuse the same client ID and secret, and authorize each connector once. Each one asks only for its own permissions.

Google verification: Google classifies the Gmail permissions this connector uses (gmail.modify, and gmail.readonly for a read-only setup) as restricted. An Internal app, used only by accounts of the Workspace organization that owns the Cloud project, needs no verification: for a company it is the straightforward route. An External app that other people use shows a "Google hasn't verified this app" warning and is capped at 100 users until it passes Google's verification, which for restricted permissions includes a security assessment. For a single personal Gmail account, an External app In production that only you use works after you continue past the warning.

Permissions: the connector asks for https://www.googleapis.com/auth/gmail.modify: read mail, change labels (mark as read, archive, star), create drafts and send mail. It works as the Google account that authorized it and sees exactly what that account sees. It cannot delete anything permanently.

What sends real email: gmail_send_message (a new email), gmail_reply (an answer inside a conversation) and gmail_send_draft (an existing draft, exactly as written) send at once from the signed-in address, and sending cannot be undone. gmail_create_draft only saves a draft, also as a reply in a conversation, for you to check and send in Gmail; the connector tells the AI to prefer a draft when you have not clearly asked to send. One message reaches at most 500 recipients. An email the AI reads could contain text asking it to send something: if the AI should only prepare mail, disable gmail_send_message, gmail_reply and gmail_send_draft and send the drafts yourself.

Read-only setup: change the scope in the connector's OAuth settings to https://www.googleapis.com/auth/gmail.readonly, authorize again and disable gmail_modify_message_labels, gmail_modify_thread_labels, gmail_create_draft, gmail_send_draft, gmail_send_message and gmail_reply.

Reading and sorting mail: searches use the same syntax as the Gmail search box, for example from:[email protected] is:unread newer_than:7d or has:attachment. Messages and conversations come back as plain text (HTML-only mail is converted); a very long body is cut at 20,000 characters, or 100,000 across a conversation. Attachments are listed with name, type and size but not downloaded. Marking as read, archiving, starring and filing under a label are label changes on one message or a whole conversation.

Rate limits: Gmail allows 6,000 quota units per minute per user. A search costs 5, reading a message 20, a conversation 40, and sending a message or draft 100. Over the limit Gmail answers 429 (or 403 userRateLimitExceeded): wait a minute and try again.

Common errors: 401 means the authorization expired or was revoked (always after 7 days while the consent screen is in Testing): click Authorize with Provider again. 403 accessNotConfigured means the Gmail API is not enabled in the Cloud project. 403 insufficientPermissions or ACCESS_TOKEN_SCOPE_INSUFFICIENT means the scope does not allow the call, for example a label change on a read-only setup. 404 means the id does not exist in this mailbox; a draft id (it starts with r-) is not a message id. 400 invalidArgument usually means a label id that does not exist: user labels have ids such as Label_12, which gmail_list_labels returns.

The connector does not send or download attachments, forward mail with its original attachments, move mail to the trash or delete it, and does not handle filters, settings, send-as aliases or other people's mailboxes.

Step 2 — Install the adapter

curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/HelpCode-ai/anythingmcp/main/docker-compose.quickstart.yml -o docker-compose.yml
printf 'JWT_SECRET=%s\nENCRYPTION_KEY=%s\n' "$(openssl rand -hex 32)" "$(openssl rand -hex 32)" > .env
docker compose up -d

Step 3 — Add the connector in Cursor

Your server URL: in AnythingMCP, open MCP Servers → the server this connector is on, and copy its URL (https://cloud.anythingmcp.com/mcp/…). Use it wherever this guide shows YOUR_SERVER_ID.

Cursor reads MCP servers from ~/.cursor/mcp.json. Add this entry:

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "anythingmcp": {
      "url": "https://cloud.anythingmcp.com/mcp/YOUR_SERVER_ID",
      "headers": { "X-API-Key": "YOUR_MCP_API_KEY" }
    }
  }
}

1. Create an MCP API key in AnythingMCP under MCP Servers → your server → API keys, and paste it in place of YOUR_MCP_API_KEY.
2. Save the file and restart Cursor.
3. Open Cursor → Settings → MCP and check that anythingmcp is listed and connected.
4. Start chatting: the agent can now call the Gmail tools.

Available tools

Example prompts

• "Which unread emails from the last 3 days still need a reply from me? Summarize each one in a sentence."
• "Find the latest email from [email protected] about the offer and draft a reply that accepts the new date. Don't send it, I'll check it in Gmail."
• "Archive and mark as read every newsletter in my inbox that is older than a week, then list what you archived."
• "List all emails with attachments since October 1 that look like invoices, with sender, date, subject and file name."

FAQ

Does Cursor support custom MCP servers on the free tier? Yes, MCP is available on Hobby, Pro and Business plans.

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