NetBox MCP Server

NetBox MCP Server

A comprehensive read-only FastMCP server that exposes NetBox API functionality to AI systems via the Model Context Protocol (MCP).

Overview

This project implements a read-only MCP server that provides comprehensive tools to interact with NetBox infrastructure data. It enables natural language queries about network devices, sites, circuits, VLANs, IP prefixes, and individual IP addresses, making it easier for AI assistants to retrieve and present network infrastructure information without allowing any modifications to the NetBox data.

Features

Device Management

• Query NetBox devices using structured filters
• Search for devices by specific name
• Use natural language to ask about devices
• Support for filtering by site, role, status, manufacturer, and more

Site Operations

• List all available sites with status and region information
• Get comprehensive site details including device and rack counts
• Site-based filtering across all resource types

Circuit Management

• Query circuits by provider, type, status, and termination sites
• Search circuits using natural language
• Track circuit terminations (A-side and Z-side)
• Filter by circuit ID patterns

IP Prefix Management

• Query IP prefixes by site, VRF, tenant, status, and role
• Support for both IPv4 and IPv6 address families
• VLAN association and filtering
• Prefix pool management
• CIDR notation pattern matching

VLAN Management

• Query VLANs by name, VID (VLAN ID), site, group, tenant, role, and status
• True substring matching for VLAN names and descriptions
• Cross-field search across VLAN properties
• Support for VLAN group and tenant organization

IP Address Management

• Query individual IP addresses by address, device, interface, VRF, and status
• Track IP assignments to devices and interfaces
• Filter by IP role (loopback, VIP, secondary, anycast)
• DNS hostname search and parent-prefix filtering
• IPv4 and IPv6 support

Prefixes vs. IP addresses: use the prefix tools for subnets/address pools/VLAN-to-subnet mapping, and the IP address tools for individual IPs assigned to devices/interfaces, DNS lookups, and IP-role filtering.

Natural Language Processing

• Intelligent parsing of natural language queries into structured API calls
• Fuzzy matching for sites, roles, providers, and circuit types
• Cross-field search capabilities
• User-friendly error messages and suggestions

Example Queries

Device Queries

• "Show me all devices at site SF1"
• "List all active firewalls"
• "Tell me about device sf1.as1"
• "Find all ION devices"
• "Show switches at NYC location"

Site Queries

• "List all available sites"
• "Tell me about site SF1"
• "Show site information for Denver"

Circuit Queries

• "Show me circuits from Zayo"
• "List Internet circuits at SF1"
• "Find circuit CID-12345"
• "Show active MPLS circuits"

IP Prefix Queries

• "Show IPv4 prefixes at SF1"
• "List all /24 subnets"
• "Find prefixes in VLAN 100"
• "Show prefix pools"

VLAN Queries

• "Show me VLAN 100"
• "List all VLANs at site SF1"
• "Find VLANs with '90' in the name"
• "Show active VLANs for tenant ABC"
• "Get all production VLANs"

IP Address Queries

• "Show me IP addresses on device switch01"
• "Find all loopback addresses"
• "What IPs are assigned to firewall01?"
• "Show IPs with hostname containing ntp"
• "List IPv4 addresses in VRF production"

Deployment

Runlayer Deployment (Recommended)

This project is crafted to support Runlayer deployment using streamable HTTP transport. Deploy to Runlayer's managed infrastructure with automatic scaling, monitoring, and HTTPS endpoints.

Prerequisites:

• Docker (or Colima) running locally
• Runlayer CLI (uvx runlayer)
• Admin API key from your Runlayer instance

Deploy:

# Initialize deployment (creates runlayer.yaml)
uvx runlayer deploy init --secret <api-key> --host <runlayer-url>

# Configure runlayer.yaml with your environment variables, then deploy
uvx runlayer deploy --config runlayer.yaml --secret <api-key> --host <runlayer-url>

For Colima users, prefix the deploy command with:

DOCKER_HOST=unix://${HOME}/.colima/docker.sock uvx runlayer deploy ...

After deployment, register the service as an MCP server in the Runlayer dashboard to make it available in the MCP catalog.

Configuration: The runlayer.yaml is pre-configured for:

• ARM64 architecture (cost-optimized)
• Port 8000 with /mcp endpoint path
• Streamable HTTP transport

Per-user authentication: In a hosted Runlayer deployment, each user authenticates with their own NetBox API token. NETBOX_TOKEN is therefore not set in runlayer.yaml — it is a Runlayer Placeholder, injected per request as the x-rl-env-NETBOX_TOKEN header and resolved by the server for that request. Only NETBOX_URL and NETBOX_SSL_VERIFY are deployment-wide env vars.

To configure it, in the connector's Headers field (Runlayer dashboard) map:

{ "x-rl-env-NETBOX_TOKEN": "{NETBOX_TOKEN}" }

and mark the NETBOX_TOKEN placeholder as required + secret. (When running locally over STDIO, the token comes from the NETBOX_TOKEN environment variable instead.)

Installation

Running Locally (STDIO)

For local use (e.g. with an MCP client like Claude Desktop), run the server over STDIO transport with uv. The server uses in-package imports, so it must be run from the src directory via --directory:

MCP_TRANSPORT=stdio \
NETBOX_URL=https://your-netbox.example.com \
NETBOX_TOKEN=your_api_token \
NETBOX_SSL_VERIFY=true \
uv run --directory src python server.py

There is no console-script entry point; the server is launched directly via python server.py (locally over STDIO) or as an HTTP service (hosted — see Deployment).

Development Setup

For development and testing:

1. Clone the repository:

   git clone https://github.com/chadkunsman/netbox_mcp.git
   cd netbox_mcp
   

2. Install in development mode:

   uv venv
   source .venv/bin/activate  # On Windows: .venv\Scripts\activate
   uv pip install -e .
   

3. Set environment variables:

   export NETBOX_URL=https://your-netbox.example.com
   export NETBOX_TOKEN=your_api_token
   export NETBOX_SSL_VERIFY=true
   

Claude Desktop Configuration

Add this to your Claude Desktop MCP configuration (~/Library/Application Support/Claude/claude_desktop_config.json on macOS), replacing the path with your local clone:

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "netbox": {
      "command": "uv",
      "args": [
        "run", "--directory",
        "/absolute/path/to/netbox_mcp/src",
        "python", "server.py"
      ],
      "env": {
        "MCP_TRANSPORT": "stdio",
        "NETBOX_URL": "https://your-netbox.example.com",
        "NETBOX_TOKEN": "your_api_token",
        "NETBOX_SSL_VERIFY": "true"
      }
    }
  }
}

Notes: MCP_TRANSPORT=stdio is required (the server defaults to HTTP). Claude Desktop launches with a minimal PATH, so if uv isn't found, use its absolute path for command (e.g. /opt/homebrew/bin/uv). Restart Claude Desktop after editing the config.

Automated Testing

Run the pytest test suite (integration tests query a real NetBox instance, so NETBOX_URL/NETBOX_TOKEN must be set, e.g. via a local .env):

# Run the full suite
uv run pytest tests/ -v

# Run only the integration tests
uv run pytest tests/test_mcp_tools.py -v

# Run with coverage
uv run pytest tests/ --cov=src

Manual Testing with MCPTools

For interactive exploration and debugging:

# List all available tools
mcp tools uv run --directory src python server.py

# Call a specific tool with parameters
mcp call get_device --params '{"name":"my-device-01"}' uv run --directory src python server.py

# Start interactive testing shell
mcp shell uv run --directory src python server.py

# View server logs during testing
mcp tools --server-logs uv run --directory src python server.py

Configuration

The server reads the following environment variables:

NetBox connection:

• NETBOX_URL: URL of your NetBox instance (e.g., https://netbox.example.com) — required
• NETBOX_TOKEN: API token with read permissions. Required for local/STDIO use; in a hosted Runlayer deployment it is supplied per user via the x-rl-env-NETBOX_TOKEN header instead (see Deployment)
• NETBOX_SSL_VERIFY: Whether to verify SSL certificates (true/false, default true)

Transport (used when launching the server):

• MCP_TRANSPORT: stdio for local use, or http (streamable HTTP) for hosted/Runlayer. Defaults to http
• MCP_HOST: Bind host for HTTP transport (default 0.0.0.0)
• MCP_PORT: Bind port for HTTP transport (default 8000)

Project Structure

netbox_mcp/
├── src/
│   ├── server.py          # Main MCP server implementation
│   ├── tools/             # Tool definitions
│   │   ├── devices.py     # Device-related tools
│   │   ├── sites.py       # Site-related tools
│   │   ├── circuits.py    # Circuit-related tools
│   │   ├── prefixes.py    # IP prefix-related tools
│   │   ├── vlans.py       # VLAN-related tools
│   │   └── ip_addresses.py # IP address-related tools
│   ├── models/            # Pydantic models
│   ├── utils/             # Shared utility functions
│   └── config/            # Configuration
│       └── netbox.py      # NetBox client configuration
├── tests/                 # Pytest test suite
│   ├── test_mcp_tools.py  # Integration tests
│   └── conftest.py        # Test fixtures
└── docs/                  # NetBox-specific documentation

License

MIT License

Contributing

Contributions are welcome! Please feel free to submit a Pull Request.