Dashboards & Data
Teach your agent to turn your business data into a live dashboard, with every number traceable to a query.
What we found works best
For database-backed dashboards, use MCP Toolbox for Databases with a read-only database user, then have the agent compile a static HTML dashboard from saved queries. On Claude paid plans, Claude Dashboards (beta) is the no-code alternative.
Read-only credentials plus saved SQL make every chart reproducible and auditable. Natural-language SQL over messy schemas often misreads fields, so the skill has the agent show the query behind every number.
Options we compared
| Option | Cost / account | Can act? | Source |
|---|---|---|---|
| ✅ MCP Toolbox for Databases Governed DB tools (Postgres, BigQuery, MySQL and more) defined in tools.yaml | free (plus database query costs) a read-only DB user | runs queries: use read-only | googleapis/mcp-toolbox Apache-2.0 · ★ 17k · pushed 2026-10-14 |
| ✅ Static HTML dashboard (our skill) Queries → JSON → a single HTML file, with no server to secure | free none | none | vendor product |
| Claude Dashboards (beta) Native dashboards for Claude paid plans (launched Oct 8, 2026, per press) | Claude paid plan Claude workspace + data connectors | read | vendor docs |
Steps
- Create a READ-ONLY database user.
- Define 3–5 KPI queries in
dashboard/queries/*.sql, each with a comment explaining what it means. - Connect MCP Toolbox (tools.yaml) or export CSVs.
- The agent runs the queries, saves
data/*.json, and compilesdashboard/index.htmlwith each chart linked to its SQL. - Schedule a daily refresh. Alert only on large moves.
Traps to avoid
- Ambiguous metrics ('active users') with no definition
- Charts with no query provenance
- Admin DB credentials in the config
Safety
- Never send, post, publish or spend money or credits without the owner's OK.
- Read-only database credentials only; never give the agent write or DDL access.
- Don't publish dashboards with customer PII; aggregate it first.
- No data leaves your systems except to the tools you approved.
🔒 Pro plan: guided install
Exact commands for Claude Code, Codex, Grok Bot and Gemini CLI, pinned commits, one step at a time with next_lesson and check_lesson, plus updates.
Stars and last push were checked against the GitHub API. Install commands come from vendor and README docs and have not been executed by us. Marked "unverified" where we couldn't confirm.