clio-mcp

# Clio MCP Server: Connect Claude to Clio Practice Management

> ### Built by [Oktopeak](https://oktopeak.com/?utm_source=github&utm_medium=readme&utm_campaign=clio-mcp&utm_content=top-byline): AI transformation & automation for law firms
> **Digital transformation for legal and healthcare businesses.** We build AI integrations, workflow automation, and custom software your firm owns outright, including this connector. → [Book a 30-min call](https://calendly.com/office-oktopeak/30min?utm_source=github&utm_medium=readme&utm_campaign=clio-mcp&utm_content=top-byline-call)

Open-source Model Context Protocol (MCP) connector that lets Claude read live data from [Clio](https://www.clio.com) (matters, custom fields, notes, contacts, documents, folders, tasks, calendar, and billing) without copying client information into chat windows. Built for law firms that care about attorney-client privilege, ABA Opinion 512 compliance, and keeping AI workflows inside their existing practice management stack.

> **TL;DR:** 34 Clio tools exposed to Claude across stdio and HTTP/SSE transports. Audit-logged for ABA Opinion 512. OAuth tokens encrypted at rest with AES-256-GCM. Local-only by default: you register your own Clio developer app, and no relay server sits in between. A separate one-click "listed" variant for the Clio App Directory uses a minimal login-only broker instead, see [Listed / one-click install variant](#listed--one-click-install-variant-app-directory). MIT license, free forever.

**Who this is for:** Law firm IT, legal operations teams, tech-forward partners, and engineers at legal tech companies. If you can follow a five-step terminal install, you can use this.

> [!TIP]
> **Not a developer? You don't need to be.**
>
> The README below assumes someone comfortable editing a JSON config file. If that's not you or your team, we deploy this for law firms: scoped credentials, audit log wired in, one custom workflow, training. A simpler one-command installer is also planned for v0.2.
>
> → **[See Guided MCP Setup](https://oktopeak.com/services/mcp-guided-setup/?utm_source=github&utm_medium=readme&utm_campaign=clio-mcp&utm_content=top-tip-svc)**, or [book a 30-min call](https://calendly.com/office-oktopeak/30min?utm_source=github&utm_medium=readme&utm_campaign=clio-mcp&utm_content=top-tip-call)

**Jump to:** [Demo](#demo) · [Setup](#setup) · [Available tools](#available-tools) · [Security & compliance](#compliance--security) · [Need it deployed for you?](#need-more-than-the-connector)

---

## Demo

Watch Claude pull live data from Clio in under a minute (matters, contacts, tasks) without copying client information into chat.

<p align="center">
  <a href="https://youtu.be/RmB0iGyJ9cs">
    <img src="docs/demo-thumbnail.png" alt="Clio MCP: Claude pulls live data" width="640">
  </a>
  <br><br>
  <a href="https://youtu.be/RmB0iGyJ9cs"><b>▶&nbsp;&nbsp;Watch the 60-second demo on YouTube</b></a>
</p>

---

**Setup tips + ABA Opinion 512 compliance updates for firms building with Claude + Clio.**

→ [Subscribe to Oktopeak Builder Notes](https://tally.so/r/q4kzk9?source=clio-readme). Short emails, easy unsubscribe.

---

## Upgrading to 2.2.0

If you installed before September 2026 you are on 2.0.1, and there is one reason to upgrade that is worth stating plainly rather than burying in a changelog.

**2.0.1 writes client data to its audit log.** Contact search queries, note subjects, matter descriptions and custom field values were all recorded verbatim in `~/.clio-mcp/audit.log`. The log is a plain file that nothing rotates. In 2.2.0 audit entries carry ids, counts, dates and page tokens only, enforced by an allowlist rather than a denylist, with a test that fails if any tool ever starts logging content again.

```bash
npm install -g @oktopeak/clio-mcp@2.2.0   # or just restart Claude Desktop if you use npx
```

Your existing `~/.clio-mcp/audit.log` still contains whatever the old version put there. It is worth reading before you decide what to do with it.

Also new since 2.0.1: custom fields and notes on matters and contacts, folder tools, matter relationships, a one-call activity summary across open matters, a config-level `READ_ONLY` mode, and full pagination on reads where a short answer would be a wrong one. See [CHANGELOG.md](CHANGELOG.md).

## Compliance & Security

This section exists because law firms evaluating AI tools have asked the right questions. Here are direct answers.

### ABA Formal Opinion 512: AI and competence

ABA Opinion 512 (2023) requires attorneys using AI tools to understand how those tools work, supervise their outputs, and maintain confidentiality of client information. This connector is designed with those obligations in mind:

- **Audit log.** Every tool call (every time Claude queries Clio on your behalf) is appended to a local log file at `~/.clio-mcp/audit.log`. Each entry records the timestamp, which tool was invoked, what arguments were passed, whether it succeeded, and the Clio user ID. The log is stored on your machine, not in any cloud service. It is append-only and never purged by the software, so your firm retains a complete record of AI-initiated data access.

- **No data retention by the connector.** The connector does not store matter data, client names, or any Clio content. It fetches from the API and passes results to Claude. The only thing persisted locally is your authentication token, and that is encrypted (see below).

- **Eleven write tools, all logged, all optional.** The connector can create matters, notes, tasks, folders, calendar entries, time entries and activities, update matters and tasks, complete tasks, and upload documents. It never deletes anything and never touches contacts or billing records. Every write is recorded in the audit log, and `READ_ONLY=true` removes all eleven write tools from the server entirely (see [Read-only mode](#read-only-mode)), so a firm can start with read access and turn writes on when it has decided to.

### Token security: encryption at rest

Your OAuth credentials are never stored in plain text. After you authenticate, the connector encrypts your access token and refresh token using **AES-256-GCM**, the same standard used by financial institutions, and writes the ciphertext to `~/.clio-mcp/tokens.enc`. The encryption key is auto-generated on first run and stored in your OS keychain (macOS Keychain, Windows Credential Manager, or Linux Secret Service), never on the filesystem in plaintext.

If someone obtained the token file without the key, they would not be able to read it.

### OAuth 2.0: no passwords stored

Authentication uses Clio's standard OAuth 2.0 flow. You log in through your browser on Clio's own login page. The connector never sees or handles your Clio password. CSRF protection is implemented via a cryptographic state parameter on every auth request.

### Local-first architecture

The connector runs entirely on your machine. There is no Clio MCP cloud service, no relay server, no third party in the middle. Your Clio API traffic goes directly from your device to Clio's servers.

This is true for the default setup below, where you register your own Clio developer application. The one-click "listed" install variant (next section) is the one exception, and only for the login step.

### Listed / one-click install variant (App Directory)

If you installed this connector via the Clio App Directory's one-click install instead of registering your own Clio developer application, you're using the *listed variant*. It uses one Clio application owned by Oktopeak, shared across every installing firm, instead of a separate application per firm. That means the application's `client_secret` cannot be distributed to your machine — it lives only on a small hosted token broker Oktopeak operates.

**What that changes, precisely:** matter data flows directly between your machine and Clio; only the login handshake passes through our token service. Every tool call — matters, contacts, documents, tasks, calendar, billing, everything — still goes directly from your machine to Clio's API, exactly as in the BYOC setup above. The broker never sees, stores, or logs any of it; it is only involved for the few seconds it takes to complete the OAuth login (and again, briefly, on token refresh). It stores nothing durable — no tokens, no session data survive past that single handshake.

Full data-flow documentation for security reviewers, including a sequence diagram and what the broker persists versus never persists, is in the token broker's repository: [`docs/DATA_FLOW.md`](https://github.com/oktopeak/clio-mcp-backend/blob/main/docs/DATA_FLOW.md).

Everything else — local AES-256-GCM token encryption, the audit log, and the 26 tools — is identical to the BYOC setup. Note that Clio's OAuth doesn't support requesting a narrower scope per login; the permissions your token carries are whatever the connecting Clio application was granted when it was registered in the Clio Developer Portal. For the listed app, that registration is kept to the minimum permission set the 26 tools need — the same principle you'd apply yourself when registering your own app for the BYOC setup. See [Option C](#option-c--one-click-via-clio-app-directory) below for the resulting Claude Desktop config.

---

## Trust Model

Three questions practitioners evaluating an AI tool for sensitive legal work should ask before installing.

### Which Claude tier should we use?

The connector secures the transport between Clio and Claude. It does NOT change what Claude itself does with data once data enters a conversation. **Claude's data handling depends on the tier you use, not on this connector.**

- **Anthropic API with zero-data-retention (ZDR)**: no-training, no-retention terms, enabled at the organization level on the Anthropic API. A small firm can obtain it; it is not reserved for large enterprise contracts. **This is the configuration we recommend for any work involving privileged clien