Add the Airtable MCP server to VS Code

Prerequisites

• VS Code installed.
• AIRTABLE_API_KEY — Airtable personal access token (format pat...), scoped to the bases and permissions you grant. Required.

Setup

{
  "servers": {
    "airtable": {
      "type": "stdio",
      "command": "npx",
      "args": [
        "-y",
        "airtable-mcp-server"
      ],
      "env": {
        "AIRTABLE_API_KEY": "<AIRTABLE_API_KEY>"
      }
    }
  }
}

Gotchas

• VS Code uses the `servers` key (not `mcpServers`) and requires `type`.

VS Code is the exception to every other client: its top-level key is "servers", not "mcpServers", and each entry needs an explicit "type" (for example "http" or "stdio"). Secrets are not inlined; instead you declare an "inputs" array and reference each value as ${input:id}, so VS Code prompts for it once and never writes it to disk. Remote servers connect natively with OAuth.