Mapbox MCP: geocoding and directions in your AI app

How to connect Mapbox to Claude, ChatGPT or Cursor

1. 1Click Connect Mapbox free and sign in with your Mapbox account.
2. 2Permanent geocoding needs extra account privileges. Switch it off if your account doesn't have them, along with any style and tileset tools your team won't use.
3. 3Add ContextGate to your AI app as a connector or MCP server. The steps for each app are on the Works with page.
4. 4Ask Cursor for the drive time between two of your offices, then open Activity to see the directions call.

Maps and routing questions for your AI app

• Geocode an address into coordinates, or reverse geocode coordinates into a place name.
• Geocode up to 50 places in one batch.
• Get directions between waypoints, with turn-by-turn steps if you want them.
• Build a travel time and distance matrix across several locations.
• Fetch a map style or a tileset's metadata while you build a map.

Location data with oversight

• Switch off permanent geocoding and other tools your account doesn't use; they're hidden and refused.
• Policies can hide personal data, such as a customer's home address, before a geocoding request goes out.
• Activity records every Mapbox call, so you can see which places your AI apps looked up.

What you get with Mapbox and ContextGate

• Your AI apps can use MapboxClaude, Cursor, ChatGPT and other AI apps reach Mapbox through the one ContextGate connection you add to them.
• You choose which tools they can useSwitch off any Mapbox tool you don't want used. It's hidden from your AI apps and refused if called.
• Every call is checked and recordedYour policies check each call (for example, personal data is hidden and secrets are blocked), and Activity keeps a record of it.

ContextGate sees only the tool calls that go through it, not your AI app's built-in tools or your chats.

Mapbox tools

Examples of what your AI apps can do in Mapbox. You'll see the exact list of tools after you connect it.

• Batch GeocodingTool to perform batch forward or reverse geocoding for multiple locations. use when you need consistent geocoding of up to 50 queries in one call.
• Forward GeocodingTool to convert free-form or structured address into geographic coordinates and place features. use when you need forward geocoding from text or address components.
• Permanent Forward GeocodingTool to perform permanent forward geocoding. use when you need enterprise-grade permanent geocoding after confirming account privileges.
• Permanent Reverse GeocodingTool to perform permanent reverse geocoding. use after obtaining coordinates to get cacheable place data. example: lon=-73.989, lat=40.733
• Reverse GeocodingTool to reverse geocode coordinates into place names. use after obtaining coordinates.
• Get Access TokenTool to extract and validate mapbox access token from connection metadata. use when you need a valid token for downstream actions.
• Request Style Embed HTMLTool to retrieve embeddable html for a mapbox style. use when you want to embed a style in an iframe after verifying access.
• Retrieve DirectionsTool to retrieve directions between waypoints. use when you need navigation routes with optional turn-by-turn instructions after confirming origin and destination.
• Retrieve Font Glyph RangesTool to retrieve font glyph ranges as pbf tiles. use when you have confirmed the font name, codepoint range, and valid token.
• Retrieve MatrixTool to retrieve a travel time and distance matrix. use when you need to compute travel durations and distances between multiple locations.
• Retrieve StyleTool to retrieve a mapbox style json. use when you need the full style definition by its id.
• Retrieve Style WMTSTool to retrieve a wmts document for a mapbox style. use when you need the wmts capabilities xml for a specific style id.
• Retrieve Tileset MetadataTool to retrieve metadata for a mapbox tileset. use when you need tilejson details including bounds, zooms, and layer info.