Authentication

Before using Kaggle-MCP, you need to authenticate with the Kaggle API. This page explains the authentication process and available methods.

Kaggle API Credentials

To use Kaggle-MCP, you need to set up your Kaggle API credentials:

1. Go to your Kaggle account settings
2. In the API section, click “Create New API Token”
3. This will download a kaggle.json file with your credentials
4. Move this file to ~/.kaggle/kaggle.json (create the directory if needed)
5. Set the correct permissions: chmod 600 ~/.kaggle/kaggle.json

Authentication Through Claude

You can authenticate directly through Claude using the authenticate() tool:

authenticate(username, key)

Parameters:

• username: Your Kaggle username
• key: Your Kaggle API key

Returns: Success message or error details

Authentication Status

Most Kaggle-MCP tools automatically check if you’re authenticated and will prompt you to authenticate if needed. The API will automatically look for credentials in:

1. Environment variables (KAGGLE_USERNAME and KAGGLE_KEY)
2. The ~/.kaggle/kaggle.json file
3. The ~/.config/kaggle/kaggle.json file (alternative location)

Credential Security

Your Kaggle API credentials grant full access to your Kaggle account, so it’s important to keep them secure:

• Never share your API key with others
• Ensure your credential file has restricted permissions (chmod 600 ~/.kaggle/kaggle.json)
• Don’t include your API key in notebooks or code repositories

Examples

Here’s an example of how to authenticate with Kaggle-MCP through Claude:

# Authenticate with Kaggle using your credentials
authenticate("your_username", "your_api_key") 

Where your_username and your_api_key are replaced with your actual Kaggle credentials.