Ask Edna with MCP

Use this article when

• You want to connect Cursor, ChatGPT, Claude Code, or another MCP-compatible AI client to Avid.
• You need to create, copy, or revoke an MCP access token.
• You want to know what an MCP-connected assistant can (and cannot) do with Edna tools.
• You are an organization admin deciding whether to allow constituent PII over MCP.

Before you start

What is Avid MCP?

MCP (Model Context Protocol) is a standard that lets AI clients call tools on other systems. Avid’s MCP server exposes a read-only set of Edna tools: report and chart lookups, metric queries, workspace info, product help, and optional donor/contact lookups.

MCP is different from chatting with Edna inside Avid:

• You ask questions in Cursor, Claude Code, or another connected client—not in the Edna panel.
• The client calls Avid tools directly with your personal access token.
• Tokens are scoped to MCP only. They cannot call Avid’s normal API routes.
• In-app Edna can build audiences, pin widgets, and propose campaigns. MCP does not. It answers and looks up data.

Create an MCP access token

1. In Avid, open your organization.
2. Go to Settings → Profile.
3. Find the MCP Access Tokens section.
4. Copy the MCP Server Endpoint if you need it. On production it is https://app.avidai.com/mcp.
5. Click Create Token.
6. Enter a name you will recognize later (for example, Cursor or Claude Code).
7. Choose an expiration: 30 days, 90 days (default), or 1 year.
8. Click Create Token.

9. Copy the token immediately and store it somewhere safe (password manager or your local MCP config).

   Avid shows the full token only once. If you close the dialog without copying it, revoke that token and create a new one.

The create dialog also shows a ready-to-paste config snippet for common MCP clients. You can copy that instead of building the JSON yourself.

Connect your AI client

Cursor

1. Open your user MCP config file: ~/.cursor/mcp.json on Mac/Linux (or the equivalent Cursor MCP settings UI).
2. Add an avid server entry with the endpoint and your token:

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "avid": {
      "url": "https://app.avidai.com/mcp",
      "headers": {
        "Authorization": "Bearer YOUR_TOKEN_HERE"
      }
    }
  }
}

3. Save the file and reload MCP servers in Cursor (or restart Cursor).
4. Confirm tools such as list_accessible_clients, search_report_pages, and list_report_metric_value appear for the Avid server.

Keep the token in your user config, not in a shared project repo.

Claude Code

1. In a terminal, add the HTTP MCP server with your token:

claude mcp add --transport http avid https://app.avidai.com/mcp --header "Authorization: Bearer YOUR_TOKEN_HERE"

2. Start a Claude Code session and ask a fundraising question (for example, “What were retained donors last year?”).
3. When Claude asks to use an Avid tool, approve the tool call.

Other MCP clients

Any client that supports remote HTTPS MCP with custom headers can use the same endpoint and Bearer token. Web connectors that only support OAuth (and cannot send a custom Authorization header) are not supported yet.

Optional: allow constituent PII over MCP

By default, MCP does not expose donor or contact tools—even if you can look those people up in Avid or in-app Edna. That is intentional: MCP sends tool results to whatever AI provider your connected client uses.

To allow names, contact details, and giving history through MCP for one organization:

1. An organization admin opens Settings for that organization.
2. Under AI Assistant Access (MCP), turn on Allow AI assistants connected via MCP to read constituent PII.
3. Save your organization settings.
4. Reload tools in your MCP client. get_contact and (on eligible plans) get_donor_profile become available when your data scope includes personal information.

You can turn this off at any time. Existing MCP tokens keep working for non-PII tools.

What you can ask

After the client is connected, ask in plain language. Useful starting points:

• “List the Avid organizations I can access.”
• “Find the Donor Retention report and summarize the main chart.”
• “What was total revenue for Fiscal Year to Date?”
• “Rank funds by revenue this year.”
• “Is our Bloomerang connection syncing?”
• “How do I create an audience in Avid?” (uses the help center tool)

If you belong to more than one organization, ask the assistant to call list_accessible_clients first, or tell it which organization to use. Advanced users can also set an X-Avid-Client-Id header on the MCP client.

Security and privacy

• Read-only. MCP tokens cannot change settings, create audiences, pin widgets, or launch campaigns.
• Your access only. Tools respect your plan, Insights permissions, and client membership.
• MCP-only tokens. An MCP token is rejected on standard Avid API routes.
• Expiration and revoke. Tokens expire on the schedule you chose. Changing your Avid password revokes your MCP tokens. You can also revoke any token from Settings → Profile.
• PII is opt-in per organization. In-app Edna tokenizes personal identifiers before they reach Avid’s AI providers. MCP does not tokenize—when PII is allowed, results go to the AI provider behind your connected client. Only enable that when your team accepts that tradeoff.
• Do not share tokens. Treat a token like a password. Never commit it to git or paste it into a shared channel.

FAQ and common issues

Still stuck? Email LockStep Support at help@avidai.com. Include:

• Which AI client you are using (Cursor, Claude Code, or other).
• Your Avid organization name.
• Whether the failure happens when creating the token, connecting the client, or calling a tool.
• The exact error message, with the token value removed.

Related articles:

• Ask Edna
• Ask Edna in Slack
• Align Avid with your CRM reporting using Data Quality Control (Data QC)
• Data Security and Compliance: Common Questions