One thing unlocks almost every Airtable + Claude build: a Personal Access Token. It's a key your Airtable account generates for you, and it takes about two minutes to get. Here's exactly how.
Go to airtable.com and sign up for free if you don't already have an account. The free plan is enough for everything in this guide.
If you already have an account, skip straight to step 2.
This is the main thing. A Personal Access Token (PAT for short) is basically a private password that lets your code talk to your Airtable account. You generate it once, copy it, and paste it wherever it's needed.
Here's how to get it:
1. Go to airtable.com/create/tokens (or click your profile icon in the top right, then "Developer hub," then "Personal access tokens").
2. Click "+ Create new token".
3. Give it a name so you remember what it's for. Something like lilyp.ai tracker is fine.
4. Under Scopes, add these four:
(Scopes just mean "what is this token allowed to do." The record scopes handle reading and writing contacts. The schema scopes let the setup --create command build your Airtable base automatically. Without them, you'd have to create all the tables and fields by hand.)
5. Under Access, choose "All current and future bases" (or select specific bases if you prefer).
6. Click "Create token". Airtable will show you the token once. Copy it now and keep it somewhere safe (a password manager, a notes app). You won't be able to see it again.
The token starts with "pat" and is a long string of letters and numbers. It looks something like patABCDEFGHIJ.1234567890abcdef.... That whole string is what you'll paste in the next step.
Open the file called config/secrets.env in the project folder (it's just a plain text file; open it in any text editor or right in Claude Code). Find the line that says AIRTABLE_PAT and paste your token after the equals sign:
Save the file. That's the whole step. The tracker reads this file at startup and uses your token to connect.
(The secrets.env file is listed in .gitignore, so if you ever push your project to GitHub, this file stays private and doesn't get uploaded. Your token is safe.)
If you're running the tracker's setup command, it'll create the Airtable base for you automatically and you can skip this. But if you're connecting to a base that already exists, here's how to find its ID.
Open your base in Airtable. Look at the URL in your browser. It looks like:
That part starting with app is your base ID. Copy it and add it to secrets.env:
There's a separate plugin (called an MCP server, basically a one-click connector) that lets you browse, filter, and update your Airtable bases directly in a Claude.ai conversation. No code, no config file. It's genuinely useful if you want to ask questions about your data without writing any queries.
To install it: in Claude.ai, go to Settings → Integrations and search for Airtable. Click install, sign in with your Airtable account, and it's done. It'll show up in any new conversation as a connected tool.
This is separate from the Personal Access Token above. They do different things. The token is for code-based projects. The MCP is for chatting with your data in Claude.ai. Both are worth having.
You've got your token. Step 2 of the setup is next.
Continue setup