Adobe InDesign

Say "Create an A4 document with 5 pages, add a red circle on page 3" — and it happens.

The most comprehensive MCP server for Adobe InDesign. 199 tools. 35 handlers. Full DOM coverage.

⚡ Click for a quick demo · v1.1.0 release

Published to npm as

indesign-nutria-mcp.

Your agent starts it with npx -y indesign-nutria-mcp — see

Quick Start. InDesign still runs on your machine:

the server reaches it over a local bridge, and nothing leaves the box.

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🚀 Why This Exists

InDesign automation has been broken for 20 years. ExtendScript is ancient. CEP panels are over-engineered. UXP scripting requires a CS degree. You just want AI to do the layout.

This MCP server fixes that. Clone it, point your agent at it, and InDesign is yours to drive like a puppeteer.

🆚 MCP vs The Old Ways

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✨ What It Can Do

📝 Text & Typography (27 tools)

Create frames, set content, apply paragraph/character styles, control formatting, search with GREP, find/replace, apply fonts, set columns, insets, auto-size, vertical justification, drop caps, keep options, hyphenation, tabs, paragraph rules, text wrap, baseline, linking/unlinking.

🎨 Shapes & Objects (20 tools)

Rectangles, ellipses, polygons, lines, groups, anchored objects — create, modify, delete, list, arrange.

🖼️ Images (5 tools)

Place from disk, query metadata, fit/proportional, adjust brightness/contrast, relink.

🎭 Colors & Swatches (6 tools)

CMYK/RGB/LAB/spot swatches, ink list, gradients, apply to fill/stroke.

📄 Pages & Documents (15 tools)

Create, open, save, close, getInfo, listOpen — plus page add/delete/duplicate/move/getInfo/listAll/applyMaster, sections.

📊 Tables (20 tools)

Create, set cells, add/delete rows/columns, merge/split, alignment, fills, strokes, insets, header/footer, row/column sizing, table styles, cell styles.

🧬 Styles (10 tools)

Paragraph, character, object styles — create, list, duplicate, delete, apply.

🏗️ Masters & Books (10 tools)

Master spreads — create, duplicate, apply, delete, list, getPages. Books — list, open, getDocuments, synchronize.

📤 Export (9 tools)

PDF, EPUB, HTML, JPG, PNG, package — plus preflight, font/swatch/table lists, and script_run() for custom ExtendScript.

🔍 Find & Replace (5 tools)

GREP find/replace, format-aware find/replace.

🔄 Transform (5 tools)

Align, distribute, rotate, scale, flip.

🔗 Interactive (5 tools)

Hyperlinks, buttons, cross-reference anchors.

📚 References (10 tools)

Footnotes, endnotes, cross-references, index entries/topics/generation.

📋 Lists (6 tools)

Define, apply to paragraph/selection, remove, restart numbering.

🧩 XML & Data Merge (11 tools)

XML tags, import/export, data merge with CSV/TSV/XML sources.

🔧 Other

Layers, effects (drop shadow, feather, transparency), TOC, sections, undo/redo, undo groups.

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🧠 Included AI Skills

Ten skills ship with the repo, auto-loaded by trigger keywords when you use any AI agent:

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🏗️ Architecture

┌─────────────────────┐       STDIO        ┌──────────────────────┐     WebSocket     ┌──────────────────┐

│ Any AI Agent │ ◄────────────────► │ indesign-nutria-mcp │ ◄───────────────► │ Adobe InDesign │ │ (Claude, OpenCode, │ │ (Node.js MCP Server) │ port 8120 │ + UXP Plugin │ │ Cursor, etc.) │ │ 35 handlers │ │ + ExtendScript │ └─────────────────────┘ │ 199 tools │ └──────────────────┘ │ 10 AI skills │ └──────────────────────┘

Two ways to reach InDesign

The MCP protocol always speaks stdio. Only the last hop differs, and you pick one per platform:

Both are supported. The plugin is the richer path (it also emits change events); the proxy exists for setups where you cannot or do not want to load a UXP panel. See WINDOWS.md for the Windows bridge and start-bridge.sh for the macOS one.

Full breakdown: the four macOS processes, the request lifecycle, the error

contract and the trust boundaries are in

docs/architecture.md.

Full Handler Catalog

tests/contract/toolInventory.test.ts pins this number, so the table cannot drift from the code without failing CI.

Verified end-to-end against InDesign 2026 (21.3) on the plugin-free macOS path: MCP stdio → WebSocket bridge → JXA proxy → InDesign, creating a document, adding a text frame, reading it back, and closing.

Closing documents from an agent? document_close defaults to

saveOptions: "no" — the only value that cannot raise a modal dialog. "ask"

opens a save prompt, and "yes" opens a Save As dialog for a document that

was never saved; both block the script until the bridge times out. Save first

with document_save { filePath }, then close.

MCP Resources

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🎯 Use Cases

🏢 Agency Production

"Create a 200-page catalog from this CSV. Product name in 14pt Arial Bold, price in 12pt Arial Regular, description i