MarkItDown MCP server

This is a small helper from Microsoft that lets your AI read files it normally cannot open, like PDFs, Word documents, spreadsheets, and web pages. It converts them into plain Markdown text, which is the format AI assistants understand best. It is handy for anyone who deals with documents all day and wants their AI to actually read them.

What this MCP server does

You tell your AI something like "read this PDF and summarize it" and give it the file location or web link. Your AI passes that to this helper program. The helper opens the file or downloads the page, converts everything inside into Markdown text, and hands it back. Your AI then reads that text and answers your question or does what you asked. You never see the conversion happen, you just get the result.

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What you can do with it

• Read a PDF and summarize it
• Turn a Word document into text your AI can edit or quote
• Pull the contents of a spreadsheet into the chat
• Read a web page and answer questions about it
• Convert a PowerPoint into readable notes
• Grab text from an image or scanned file

Try asking your AI

• “Read the file at /home/user/reports/q3.pdf and give me the key points”
• “Summarize this web page: https://example.com/article”
• “What does the spreadsheet at /home/user/data/budget.xlsx say about our spending”
• “Convert this Word doc into Markdown so I can paste it into our wiki”

What it gives back to you

You get back the content of the file or page, turned into clean text, plus whatever your AI does with it, like a summary, a list of key points, or an answer to your question. It does not change or save anything on your computer. It only reads and converts.

Before you start

Who it's for

Anyone who works with lots of documents, PDFs, or web pages and wants their AI to read them without copy-pasting.