Anymd

anymd

PDF, Word, PowerPoint, Excel, EPUB, HTML and web pages, images (OCR), audio and video (metadata, subtitles, transcripts). A fast Rust MCP server and CLI that runs on your machine. No API key.

Install · Benchmarks · Tools · CLI · Formats · Docs · Pro

Formerly pdf-reader-mcp. Migrating from pdf-reader-mcp

A real, unedited terminal recording (asciinema + agg, script). The last command is Claude Code answering from the PDF through the anymd MCP server.

npx -y @sylphx/anymd setup              # add anymd to every MCP client on this machine
npx -y @sylphx/anymd report.pdf > report.md   # or convert from the shell

Why anymd

• Fast. Native Rust converts in parallel, page by page. On the 38 benchmark documents, anymd takes 11.5 s in total; docling 2,432.4 s (212×), markitdown 75.6 s (7×); marker converted 30 of them in 7,104.5 s, against anymd's 4.64 s on the same 30 (1,532×).

• Accurate. A layout engine rebuilds words from glyph gaps, puts two-column papers in reading order, and recovers tables, including borderless ones. The text stays exactly as printed, with no glued words and no scrambled columns.

• Lean on tokens. Pages come back as Markdown with `` citation anchors, a small front-matter header, and compact tables. A token budget and a cursor keep large documents within your agent's context.

• Every format, one call. One tool reads every format listed below. It also accepts web URLs and whole directories, and search looks across all of them.

• Local and private. Nothing is uploaded. OCR uses installed local doc-VLM models or tesseract; transcripts use ffmpeg and bundled Qwen3-ASR. OCR setup and ASR model downloads require explicit opt-in.

Install

Add anymd to every MCP client on your machine (Claude Code, Codex, Cursor, VS Code, Claude Desktop, Windsurf, Gemini CLI) with one command:

npx -y @sylphx/anymd setup     # --dry-run to preview, --remove to undo

Or add it by hand: every MCP client runs the same command, npx -y @sylphx/anymd. Node 18+ is the only requirement; npm installs the native binary for your platform.

Claude Code

claude mcp add anymd -- npx -y @sylphx/anymd

Or as a plugin, with the anymd skill: /plugin marketplace add SylphxAI/anymd, then /plugin install anymd@anymd.

Codex

codex mcp add anymd -- npx -y @sylphx/anymd

or in ~/.codex/config.toml:

[mcp_servers.anymd]
command = "npx"
args = ["-y", "@sylphx/anymd"]

Cursor

or in .cursor/mcp.json:

{ "mcpServers": { "anymd": { "command": "npx", "args": ["-y", "@sylphx/anymd"] } } }

VS Code

Install in VS Code with one click, or from a terminal:

code --add-mcp '{"name":"anymd","command":"npx","args":["-y","@sylphx/anymd"]}'

or in .vscode/mcp.json:

{ "servers": { "anymd": { "type": "stdio", "command": "npx", "args": ["-y", "@sylphx/anymd"] } } }

Claude Desktop