Connect your notes to Gemini with MCP

Gemini can use your notes through MCP, the same standard ChatGPT and Claude use. The reliable way today is Gemini CLI, which takes one command. The Gemini app can add MCP servers too, with more strings attached. Here are both, and what I could and couldn't check.

Settings

Gemini CLI: one command

Gemini CLI is Google's open-source agent for the terminal. It connects to MCP servers, including remote ones that sign in with OAuth, which is how Amber Notes works. I've checked this path end to end.

1. Install the Amber Notes extension: gemini extensions install https://github.com/emilwagman/amber-notes
2. Start Gemini CLI and run /mcp auth amber-notes. Your browser opens ambernotes.app to sign in.
3. The page shows a two-digit number. Amber Notes on your iPhone or Mac asks whether to allow the app: type the number, choose Read Only or Read and Edit, and choose Allow.
4. Back in Gemini CLI, run /mcp to see amber-notes connected with its tools, then ask: “Search my Amber Notes for the standup and summarise this week.”

Rather not install an extension? Add the server yourself, for every project: gemini mcp add --scope user --transport http amber-notes https://mcp.ambernotes.app, then sign in with /mcp auth amber-notes the same way. Gemini CLI finds the sign-in details from the server on its own. Google documents both commands in MCP servers with Gemini CLI.

The Gemini app: custom apps (not yet tested)

The Gemini app on the web can add an MCP server as a custom app. I couldn't test this with Amber Notes: it needs an account that meets Google's conditions, and I haven't had one. So treat these steps as what Google's documentation says, not something I've seen work.

Google lists these conditions in Connect & manage custom apps:

• a personal Google Account (not work or school), and age 18 or over, in the US
• Keep Activity turned on, and the app in English
• set up on gemini.google.com on a computer; after that, Google says it works on mobile too

Some third-party guides also say it needs a Google AI Pro or Ultra plan. Google's page, as I read it, doesn't say, so check what your account offers.

1. On gemini.google.com, open Settings, then Connected Apps.
2. Under Custom apps, choose Add a custom app.
3. Enter https://mcp.ambernotes.app. Amber Notes supports dynamic client registration, so the Advanced features credentials shouldn't be needed.
4. Choose Next and follow the prompts. When ambernotes.app opens, sign in and approve on your iPhone or Mac as above.

If you try it, I'd like to hear how it goes. Amber Notes names ChatGPT and Claude on the approval sheet; any other app, Gemini included, is shown with a warning that Amber Notes doesn't recognize it, so check that you just started connecting it yourself.

What Gemini can do with your notes

• Search and read notes, with Read Only.
• With Read and Edit: create notes, append to one, tick checklist items and add table rows. Each change shows up tinted in Amber Notes with an Undo, and the previous version is kept.
• Locked notes stay out of reach: Gemini sees only their titles.

The Amber Notes MCP server page lists every tool. For the other assistants, see connect ChatGPT or Claude and Claude Code and Codex. Notes apps with an MCP server compares the options.

Questions

Checked against the app on 1 October 2026.