Installation

1. Download the gitea-mcp Binary

The official gitea-mcp project (from the Gitea team itself) provides prebuilt binaries.

macOS (ARM64 / Apple Silicon)

curl -L -o /tmp/gitea-mcp.tar.gz \
  "https://gitea.com/gitea/gitea-mcp/releases/download/v1.3.0/gitea-mcp_Darwin_arm64.tar.gz"
tar -xzf /tmp/gitea-mcp.tar.gz -C /tmp/

macOS (Intel x86_64)

curl -L -o /tmp/gitea-mcp.tar.gz \
  "https://gitea.com/gitea/gitea-mcp/releases/download/v1.3.0/gitea-mcp_Darwin_x86_64.tar.gz"
tar -xzf /tmp/gitea-mcp.tar.gz -C /tmp/

Linux (x86_64)

curl -L -o /tmp/gitea-mcp.tar.gz \
  "https://gitea.com/gitea/gitea-mcp/releases/download/v1.3.0/gitea-mcp_Linux_x86_64.tar.gz"
tar -xzf /tmp/gitea-mcp.tar.gz -C /tmp/

Linux (ARM64)

curl -L -o /tmp/gitea-mcp.tar.gz \
  "https://gitea.com/gitea/gitea-mcp/releases/download/v1.3.0/gitea-mcp_Linux_arm64.tar.gz"
tar -xzf /tmp/gitea-mcp.tar.gz -C /tmp/

Windows

curl -L -o gitea-mcp.zip \
  "https://gitea.com/gitea/gitea-mcp/releases/download/v1.3.0/gitea-mcp_Windows_x86_64.zip"
# Extract and place in PATH

2. Install to System PATH

sudo mv /tmp/gitea-mcp /usr/local/bin/gitea-mcp
sudo chmod +x /usr/local/bin/gitea-mcp

Why /usr/local/bin? Goose's SearchPaths resolver includes /usr/local/bin (and /opt/homebrew/bin on macOS). Placing the binary here ensures Goose can find it when spawning the MCP process.

3. Verify

gitea-mcp -v
# Output: 1.3.0

4. Get a Gitea Access Token

Go to your Gitea instance: Settings → Applications → Manage Access Tokens
Generate a new token with these scopes (at minimum):
- read:repository
- write:repository
- read:issue
- write:issue
- read:user
For full functionality, also enable:
- write:package
- write:notification
Save the token securely — you'll need it in the configuration step.

5. (Optional) Set Up SSH for Git Operations

The MCP handles Gitea API calls. For git clone, git push, and git pull, configure SSH separately — see SSH Setup.