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Asana has spent the last year pushing further into AI, with AI Studio, AI Teammates, and now an MCP (Model Context Protocol) server: a way to point Claude, Cursor, VS Code or any other MCP-compatible client straight at your Asana workspace and have it read and act on tasks, projects and comments without opening the Asana UI.
Two servers cover this today: Asana’s own official server, and a mature third-party option that predates it. Here’s how they compare, and how to connect either one.
Official vs third-party: Asana’s MCP landscape
| Official (mcp.asana.com/v2/mcp) | Third-party (roychri/mcp-server-asana) | |
|---|---|---|
| Status | Generally available (V2) | Actively maintained, MIT licensed |
| Auth | OAuth 2.0, pre-registered client ID and secret | Personal access token (ASANA_ACCESS_TOKEN) |
| Setup time | ~10 minutes, registering an OAuth app and redirect URLs | ~5 minutes via npx |
| Tool count | 30+ tools covering tasks, projects, workspaces and comments | Similar coverage, plus a READ_ONLY_MODE flag |
| Safety controls | Tokens are scoped to MCP only, containing the blast radius | READ_ONLY_MODE disables all write operations when set |
| Cost | Free | Free, open source |
Asana’s developer docs are explicit that the V2 server requires OAuth 2.0 authentication with a registered client ID and secret: there’s no personal access token option built into the official server. If you need a static token instead (useful for scripted or headless setups), the third-party roychri/mcp-server-asana is the established alternative, with 144+ stars and thousands of weekly npm downloads.
Connecting an AI client to Asana’s MCP server
Setting up the official server with Claude, Cursor or VS Code
- In the Asana developer console (app.asana.com/0/my-apps), create a new app and choose the “MCP app” type, Asana’s label for apps that work with its remote MCP server rather than the standard API.
- Register your OAuth redirect URLs, matching whichever client you’re connecting (VS Code needs two redirect URLs; other clients typically need one).
- Add the server URL
https://mcp.asana.com/v2/mcpto your client, along with your registered client ID and secret. - Authorise the connection when your client prompts you. Tokens issued for MCP apps only work with the MCP server, so a compromised token can’t be reused against the wider Asana API.
Self-hosting the third-party server via npx
- Grab a personal access token from your Asana account settings.
- Add the server to your client config, for example:
npx -y @roychri/mcp-server-asanawithASANA_ACCESS_TOKENset as an environment variable. - Optionally set
READ_ONLY_MODEtotrueto disable all write operations while you’re testing. - Restart your client. No hosting or deployment step is needed since it runs locally via npx.
What can you do with it once connected?
Once either server is connected, you can ask your AI client to search and filter tasks by assignee, due date or status, create and update tasks and projects, manage sections and project memberships, add comments and attachments, and work with custom fields and tags, all in natural language instead of clicking through Asana’s UI.
If you’re evaluating Asana itself for a marketing team, rather than just its MCP server, see our breakdown of Asana alternatives for marketing teams or the head-to-head against Growth Method. For the rest of the marketing MCP landscape, browse our MCP servers for marketers roundup.
About Growth Method
Asana’s MCP server is a useful way to ask an AI client about task status or make one-off edits, but it’s still bound to Asana’s Work Graph: tasks, projects and people, with no concept of a campaign, a hypothesis, or a growth goal. Growth Method is the agentic marketing platform for B2B teams: plan, launch, and analyse campaigns with pre-built AI agents that work from your live marketing data, not from a generic task graph. Connect your stack, including GitHub, PostHog, GA4 and more, once, and both your team and its agents can move campaigns through a structured plan, launch, analyse lifecycle and report on what actually moved the needle.
Get started: first month free, no credit card required.
Frequently asked questions
Does Asana have an official MCP server?
Yes. Asana’s official V2 MCP server is hosted at mcp.asana.com/v2/mcp, is generally available, and requires OAuth 2.0 authentication with a client ID and secret you register in the Asana developer console.
Does Asana’s MCP server support personal access token authentication?
Not directly. The official server only supports OAuth 2.0 with a pre-registered client, so there’s no personal access token option built in. The third-party roychri/mcp-server-asana accepts a personal access token via the ASANA_ACCESS_TOKEN environment variable if you need that instead.
What can the Asana MCP server do?
Across both servers, tools cover creating, updating, deleting and searching tasks, managing projects, sections and project memberships, filtering by assignee, due date and status, adding comments and attachments, and managing custom fields and tags.
Is Asana’s older V1 MCP server still supported?
No. Asana’s V1 beta MCP server at mcp.asana.com/sse is deprecated and being shut down. Any integration still pointing at it needs to migrate to the V2 endpoint at mcp.asana.com/v2/mcp.