Skip to content

Installation Guide

Prerequisites

  • Windows (this project drives a real, local PowerPoint desktop process via COM — there is no cross-platform or headless mode)
  • Microsoft PowerPoint (desktop) installed and licensed
  • .NET 10 runtime — only required for the NuGet dotnet tool install path; the standalone executable and MCPB bundle are self-contained

Choose your install path

Install the MCP server as a global .NET tool. Requires the .NET 10 runtime.

dotnet tool install --global Sbroenne.PowerPointMcp.McpServer

Runs as the mcp-powerpoint command once installed.

Install the token-efficient CLI for coding agents. Requires the .NET 10 runtime.

dotnet tool install --global Sbroenne.PowerPointMcp.CLI

Runs as the pptcli command once installed.

Download a self-contained build from GitHub Releases — no .NET runtime install needed.

# https://github.com/sbroenne/mcp-server-powerpoint/releases/latest
# Extract and run mcp-powerpoint.exe / pptcli.exe directly

One-click install that auto-configures the MCP server for GitHub Copilot Chat in VS Code.

Install Extension

One-click install for Claude Desktop via the MCP Bundle (.mcpb) format.

# https://github.com/sbroenne/mcp-server-powerpoint/releases/latest
# Download the .mcpb file and open it with Claude Desktop

Discoverable through the official MCP Registry for any MCP-compatible client that supports registry-based discovery.

Manual configuration

After installing via NuGet or the standalone executable, point your MCP client at the server:

# After installing either way, auto-configure supported coding agents
npx add-mcp "mcp-powerpoint" --name powerpoint-mcp

Or configure manually in your client's MCP settings (VS Code mcp.json, Claude Desktop config, etc.) to run mcp-powerpoint (NuGet tool install) or the path to the extracted mcp-powerpoint.exe (standalone download).

Agent Skills

Skills give AI assistants workflow guidance beyond raw tool schemas — strongly recommended, especially for the CLI, and useful even for the MCP server's richer tool discovery:

npx skills add sbroenne/mcp-server-powerpoint --skill powerpoint-mcp

Tip

The VS Code extension installs this skill automatically to ~/.copilot/skills/powerpoint-mcp/. Manual npx skills add is for other clients (Claude Code, Cursor, Windsurf, etc.).

Verifying your install

Ask your AI assistant something like:

"Create a new PowerPoint presentation with a title slide, then export it as an image so I can see it."

If the assistant can call create_presentation, add_slide, set_text and export_slide_to_image and you get back a rendered PNG of a real PowerPoint slide, you're set up correctly.

Troubleshooting

  • "PowerPoint is not installed" errors — this project requires the full PowerPoint desktop application (not PowerPoint Online / Mobile) to be installed and activated on the same Windows machine running the MCP server.
  • Lingering POWERPNT.EXE processes — sessions are cleaned up on close_presentation and on MCP server shutdown; if a process lingers after a crash, close it from Task Manager.
  • .NET tool not found on PATH — restart your terminal after dotnet tool install --global so the updated PATH is picked up.

More information