Kreuzberg
A polyglot document intelligence framework with a Rust core. Extract text, metadata, images, and structured information from PDFs, Office documents, images, and 97+ formats. Available for Rust, Python, Ruby, Java, Go, PHP, Elixir, C#, R, C, TypeScrip
What is Kreuzberg?
Kreuzberg is a Model Context Protocol (MCP) server that allows AI assistants like Claude, Cursor, and VS Code to polyglot document intelligence framework with a rust core. extract text, metadata, images, and structured information from pdfs, office documents, images, and 97+ formats. available for rust, python, ...
A polyglot document intelligence framework with a Rust core. Extract text, metadata, images, and structured information from PDFs, Office documents, images, and 97+ formats. Available for Rust, Python, Ruby, Java, Go, PHP, Elixir, C#, R, C, TypeScrip
This server falls under the Search & Data Extraction category on MCPgee, the world's largest MCP server directory with 33,000+ servers.
Features
- A polyglot document intelligence framework with a Rust core.
Use Cases
Maintainer
Works with
Installation
Manual Installation
npx kreuzbergConfiguration
Configuration Details
claude_desktop_config.json
Performance
Response Metrics
Resource Usage
How to Set Up and Use Kreuzberg
Kreuzberg is a polyglot document intelligence framework with a Rust core that extracts text, metadata, and structured content from over 96 file formats including PDFs, Office documents, images with OCR, code files across 306 programming languages, emails, and archives. Its MCP server mode exposes three tools — extract_file, extract_bytes, and batch_extract — that allow AI assistants to read and analyze documents that would otherwise be opaque binary files. Data engineers, researchers, and developers use it to give AI models access to document content in automated pipelines without writing custom parsers for each format.
Prerequisites
- Python 3.9 or newer (for pip install) OR Docker OR the Rust toolchain
- An MCP client such as Claude Desktop, Cursor, or Cline
- Optional: Tesseract OCR installed for image text extraction
- Optional: ONNX Runtime 1.24+ for embedding-based features
Install Kreuzberg
Install the Kreuzberg Python package using pip. This includes the CLI and MCP server mode.
pip install kreuzbergVerify the installation
Confirm that the kreuzberg CLI is available and check the version.
kreuzberg --versionStart the MCP server
Run the MCP server in stdio mode (default), which is what Claude Desktop and most MCP clients use.
kreuzberg mcpConfigure your MCP client
Add Kreuzberg to your MCP client configuration. The server runs via the kreuzberg mcp command on stdio.
{
"mcpServers": {
"kreuzberg": {
"command": "kreuzberg",
"args": ["mcp"]
}
}
}Optional: run with HTTP transport
For clients that prefer HTTP over stdio, start the server with the HTTP transport on a custom port.
kreuzberg mcp --transport http --host 127.0.0.1 --port 8001Kreuzberg Examples
Client configuration
Claude Desktop or Claude Code configuration for Kreuzberg MCP server using stdio transport.
{
"mcpServers": {
"kreuzberg": {
"command": "kreuzberg",
"args": ["mcp"]
}
}
}Prompts to try
Example prompts demonstrating document extraction across different file types.
- "Extract the text from /path/to/contract.pdf and summarize the key terms"
- "Read the Excel file at /reports/q3-data.xlsx and tell me the column headers"
- "Extract all text from these three scanned images and combine them into a single document"
- "Use batch_extract to process all PDF files in /documents/ and find any that mention 'compliance'"
- "Extract metadata from /presentation.pptx — who created it and when was it last modified?"Troubleshooting Kreuzberg
OCR extraction returns empty text for image files
Kreuzberg uses Tesseract for OCR by default. Install it with 'brew install tesseract' on macOS or 'apt install tesseract-ocr' on Ubuntu. Alternatively, enable PaddleOCR or EasyOCR backends, or use VLM OCR with an API key from a provider like OpenAI or Anthropic.
kreuzberg command not found after pip install
Ensure your Python Scripts or bin directory is on your PATH. Run 'pip show kreuzberg' to find the install location. On macOS/Linux, you may need to add ~/.local/bin to your PATH. Alternatively, run 'python -m kreuzberg mcp' as the command in your MCP config.
Password-protected PDFs fail to extract
Kreuzberg supports RC4 and AES encrypted PDFs. Pass the password using the extract_file tool's password parameter. Check the tool schema in your MCP client for the exact parameter name.
Frequently Asked Questions about Kreuzberg
What is Kreuzberg?
Kreuzberg is a Model Context Protocol (MCP) server that polyglot document intelligence framework with a rust core. extract text, metadata, images, and structured information from pdfs, office documents, images, and 97+ formats. available for rust, python, ruby, java, go, php, elixir, c#, r, c, typescrip It connects AI assistants to external tools and data sources through a standardized interface.
How do I install Kreuzberg?
Follow the installation instructions on the Kreuzberg GitHub repository. Clone the repo, install dependencies, and add the server config to your AI client.
Which AI clients work with Kreuzberg?
Kreuzberg works with all major MCP-compatible AI clients including Claude Desktop, Claude Code, Cursor, VS Code (GitHub Copilot), Windsurf, and Cline.
Is Kreuzberg free to use?
Yes, Kreuzberg is open source and available under the NOASSERTION license. You can use it freely in both personal and commercial projects.
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Set Up Kreuzberg in Your Editor
Choose your AI client for step-by-step setup instructions.
Quick Config Preview
Add this to your claude_desktop_config.json or .cursor/mcp.json
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