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Connect Claude (MCP)

Zenith ships a local Model Context Protocol server — @zenith-books/mcp — that gives Claude Desktop, Claude Code, and other MCP-aware clients read-only access to one company's books through this API. Ask "what was our burn in June?" and Claude pulls the real numbers.

You don't install anything permanently: your MCP client runs the server on demand via npx.

Setup

First create an API token and copy the token + company key.

Claude Desktop and Claude Code are configured separately — they don't share MCP settings. The JSON file below only affects the Desktop app; the claude mcp add command only affects Claude Code in the terminal. Use whichever you work in (or both).

Claude Desktop

Add to claude_desktop_config.json — the easiest way to open it is Settings → Developer → Edit Config inside Claude Desktop (the file lives at ~/Library/Application Support/Claude/ on macOS, %APPDATA%\Claude\ on Windows). Restart the app afterwards:

Code
{
  "mcpServers": {
    "zenith": {
      "command": "npx",
      "args": ["-y", "@zenith-books/mcp@latest"],
      "env": {
        "ZENITH_API_TOKEN": "zth_live_…",
        "ZENITH_COMPANY_KEY": "a0b6156c-…"
      }
    }
  }
}

Claude Code

One command in the terminal (this does not configure Claude Desktop):

Code
claude mcp add zenith \
  --env ZENITH_API_TOKEN=zth_live_… \
  --env ZENITH_COMPANY_KEY=a0b6156c-… \
  -- npx -y @zenith-books/mcp@latest

The server talks to hub.zenith-books.com by default — no URL configuration needed. (Self-hosting or testing? Set ZENITH_API_URL to override.)

An API token gives access to exactly one company. If you want Claude to see several of your companies, repeat this setup once per company, each with that company's token and a distinct name in place of zenith — e.g. zenith-acme, zenith-globex.

What Claude can do with it

Tools — list_transactions, get_transaction, list_expenses, get_expense, list_bank_accounts, list_partners, and yearly_summary (fast monthly aggregates — Claude reaches for this first on "how much did we…" questions).

Prompts — ready-made report templates in the slash menu:

• monthly-expense-report — expenses for a month, grouped by category and partner
• partner-spending-analysis — spend trend with one supplier over a period
• cashflow-summary — inflow/outflow per bank account over a period

Good to know

• Everything is read-only — Claude cannot create, modify, or pay anything.
• The MCP server is a thin client over this public API: same auth, same rate limits (it backs off automatically on 429), same data. Nothing touches your database directly.
• Revoke access anytime by revoking the token in Settings → API tokens.