What is a Bitly MCP?
It's an MCP server that connects your agents to Bitly's link management platform via tools. Your agents can invoke these tools to shorten URLs, retrieve click analytics, update link destinations, manage link groups, and more.
Bitly offers an official MCP server, but you can also use one from a third-party platform, like Merge Agent Handler.
How can I use the Bitly MCP server?
The use cases naturally depend on the agent you've built, but here are a few common ones:
- Automated link creation on publish: When a new article or campaign asset goes live in your CMS, an agent detects the event, calls Bitly to generate a shortened and tracked URL, and posts it to the appropriate Slack channel or updates a campaign tracker
- Cross-platform analytics reporting: An agent pulls click and scan data from Bitly for all links in a group, combines it with campaign performance data from a marketing tool, and delivers a weekly digest to stakeholders
- Link shortening from Slack: A Slack-based agent listens for messages containing raw URLs in a designated channel, calls Bitly to create a bitlink, and replies in-thread with the shortened version
- Bulk link auditing during rebrands: When a domain migration is planned, an agent lists all bitlinks in a group, checks each destination against a list of deprecated domains, and flags or updates any that need to be redirected
What are popular tools for Bitly's MCP server?
Here are some of the most commonly used tools:
create_bitlink: generates a shortened Bitly URL from a long link, with optional custom back-half and title. Use this when an agent needs to produce a trackable short URL as part of a publishing or distribution workflowget_bitlink: fetches metadata and click statistics for a specific bitlink. Helpful when an agent needs to pull performance data for reporting or verify a link's current destinationupdate_bitlink: modifies a bitlink's destination URL, title, or archived state. Good for workflows that handle domain migrations or need to swap out a link target without changing the short URLlist_group_bitlinks: returns all bitlinks within a group, filterable by tag, keyword, or creation date. Call this when an agent needs to audit or process a collection of links in bulkexpand_bitlink: resolves a shortened Bitly URL back to its full original destination. Useful for agents that need to verify where a short link points before taking a downstream actionget_group_tags: retrieves all tags applied to links within a group. Use this when an agent needs to categorize or filter links by campaign, content type, or team
What makes Merge Agent Handler's Bitly MCP server better than alternative Bitly MCP servers?
Here's why teams choose Merge Agent Handler's Bitly MCP server over building their own or using another option:
- Enterprise-grade security and DLP: Merge Agent Handler includes built-in data loss prevention controls that let you block or redact sensitive fields before they reach an agent. For Bitly, this means you can prevent link destination URLs, click analytics, and account details from being exposed even when the agent has broad read access
- Managed authentication and credentials: Merge stores and refreshes Bitly credentials on your behalf. You never expose raw API keys or OAuth tokens to an agent or handle token rotation yourself
- Real-time observability and audit trail: Every tool call made against Bitly is logged with timestamp, tool name, input parameters, and response metadata. You get a full record of what an agent created, read, or modified without any custom instrumentation
- Tool Packs and controlled access: Tool Packs let you bundle specific Bitly tools with tools from other connectors into a single MCP endpoint, scoped to a specific use case. An agent gets exactly the tools it needs, nothing more
How can I start using Merge Agent Handler's Bitly MCP server?
You can take the following steps:
1. Create or log into your Merge Agent Handler account and navigate to Tool Packs (collections of connector tools scoped to a specific use case).
2. Create a new Tool Pack, then find and enable the Bitly connector. Choose which tools to include: enable read tools like get_bitlink and list_group_bitlinks for analytics and auditing use cases, or add write tools like create_bitlink and update_bitlink if your agent needs to create or modify links.
3. Add a Registered User inside the Tool Pack. This is the identity context under which your agent operates. Merge generates a unique MCP URL scoped to this user once it's created.
4. From the Registered User detail page, authenticate Bitly by completing the OAuth or API key credential flow. Merge stores and manages the credentials going forward.
5. Copy the MCP URL from the Tool Pack detail page and generate an API key from Settings. You'll need both to connect your agent.
6. Add the MCP server to your agent or IDE using the MCP URL and API key. Your Bitly tools are now accessible through that endpoint.