Post to TikTok from Claude Code

Claude Code can render and upload to TikTok drafts in one pass. Public posting is what TikTok withholds from unaudited apps — the refusal happens before an upload, not after.

Hermoso is a marketing MCP server: 301 tools over one OAuth’d endpoint that let an agent research the ads already running in a market, generate finished image and video ads, publish them, and build the paid campaigns behind them. Claude Code reaches all of it through one connection. This page is about one slice of that — what Claude Code can actually do on TikTok, and what TikTok will not let it do.

Connect Hermoso to Claude Code

  1. Create an API key. In Hermoso, open Settings → Agents & API keys and press + Create API key. It looks like hmk_… and carries real spend authority, so treat it like a password.
  2. Add the server.
    claude mcp add --transport http hermoso https://app.hermoso.ai/mcp \
      --header "Authorization: Bearer <your key>"
  3. Or run it over stdio if you would rather not hold an HTTP config:
    claude mcp add hermoso -e HERMOSO_TOKEN=hmk_… -- npx -y hermoso mcp
  4. Ask Claude Code for something. “Pull my three closest competitors’ longest-running ads and remix the best hook into a 9:16 video,” or “post this render to the channel.” The agent picks the tools; you approve the spend.

Both forms reach the same 301 tools. The HTTP form is the hosted server; the stdio form runs the published hermoso npm package locally and talks to the same account.

Then connect TikTok itself, once, under Settings → Connectors in Hermoso. That is an OAuth consent screen, so it is the one step that needs a browser — everything after it is a tool call.

The TikTok tools Claude Code gets

  • post_to_tiktok — uploads a finished video, or a photo post of up to 35 images, either straight to the profile or into your TikTok drafts. It also carries the interaction settings — comments, duet, stitch — the cover frame, and the branded-content disclosure.
  • schedule_post — queues it for later on the shared calendar.
  • tiktok_account / tiktok_creator_info — the account’s bio, verification, follower and video counts, and what privacy levels the account itself allows.
  • list_tiktok_videos — recent posts with views, likes, comments and shares.
  • search_tiktok — keyword search across public TikTok — the research half.

Two more operational facts. TikTok photo posts are pulled from a URL rather than uploaded, so the host serving the images has to be verified in TikTok’s developer portal before photo posts can go out at all. And there are no TikTok comment or moderation tools here — publishing and reading are covered, replying is not.

TikTok limits worth knowing before you automate anything

TextA TikTok video caption is capped at 2,200 characters, a photo-post caption at 4,000, and a photo title at 90. It is enforced when the post is created or queued — refused while you are still there to fix it, rather than silently cut on the way out.
VisibilityThis is the one to read before you plan anything. TikTok’s content-sharing guidelines restrict an unaudited app to self-only posts, TikTok enforces it at post time, and Hermoso refuses up front rather than failing hours later: “until the app passes TikTok’s review, their content-sharing guidelines restrict it to SELF_ONLY (private-to-you) posts. Two things that DO work right now: post with privacy SELF_ONLY, or send it to TikTok drafts (destination 'draft') and publish it yourself in the app.” Hermoso has not passed TikTok’s review yet, so that is today’s behaviour — and the scheduler removes public from TikTok’s options at enqueue rather than accepting a schedule that is guaranteed to fail.
CarouselUp to 35 images as a TikTok photo post, images only. That number is TikTok’s: “An array containing up to 35 photo content URLs.” The order is the slideshow, so slide order is the product. One image is simply a one-slide post, not a refusal.
Which accountNone — TikTok publishes to the connected account.

Try it in Claude Code

Ask for it in ordinary language — these are sentences, not a DSL:

“Render three variations of the hook, upload all three to TikTok drafts with their captions and cover frames set, and print the draft ids.”

That walks search_tiktokplan_adrender_adpost_to_tiktok. Claude Code asks before it runs a tool, and the transcript is right there in the terminal — so a publish step is a line you can read before you press y.

Claude Code on TikTok: the part that bites

The drafts path is what makes TikTok usable from a terminal at all: an agent can produce and upload a batch, and the publish decision stays a human tap in the TikTok app. Do not build a pipeline around public posting — while Hermoso is unaudited, TikTok accepts only self-only from it, and Hermoso refuses up front with “nothing was uploaded and nothing was charged” rather than burning a render.

A 301-tool manifest is not free in context. For long unattended runs the hermoso CLI is the cheaper path: the agent shells out per command instead of carrying the whole manifest.

Research TikTok before you post

There is no TikTok ad library to search the way Meta’s can be searched, so TikTok research is organic: search_tiktok finds what is working by keyword, and analyze_video will pull a clip apart into its hook, beats and on-screen text so the pattern can be reused rather than guessed at.

The paid half

Hermoso does not manage TikTok ad campaigns, and says so rather than implying it. TikTok Ads is a separate connector that has not been built. What Hermoso does on TikTok is organic: make the video, post or draft it, read the account back.

What Claude Code cannot do on its own

An agent with a budget is only useful if the blast radius is bounded, so the fence is in the server rather than in a prompt. Every ad campaign, ad set, ad group and ad is created paused, and the status switches that arm real money refuse to run without an explicit confirmation flag. Every render is quoted first — hermoso_capabilities publishes each model’s exact credit cost before anything spends — and credits are reserved before the first provider call and settled at the exact cost afterwards, so a failed dispatch refunds rather than leaving you billed for nothing. Deletes are confirm-gated too, and every campaign tree is read back from the ad platform before your agent tells you what it built.

One step is deliberately not headless: linking an account is an OAuth consent screen, so you connect the channel once in a browser. Everything after that is a tool call.

The rest of the matrix

From Claude Code, post to: Facebook · Instagram · Threads · YouTube · X · LinkedIn · Pinterest — or see everything Claude Code can publish to.

Post to TikTok from: Claude · ChatGPT · Cursor · Codex · Cline · OpenClaw · Hermes · Claude Code marketing

Frequently asked questions

Can Claude Code post to TikTok?

Yes, through Hermoso's MCP server. Create an API key in Hermoso under Settings → Agents & API keys, then add https://app.hermoso.ai/mcp to Claude Code with an Authorization: Bearer header. Claude Code then has 301 tools, including the ones that publish to TikTok — and the ones that research the ads already running in your market and render the creative in the first place.

How do I connect TikTok to Claude Code?

Two steps, once each. Create an API key in Hermoso under Settings → Agents & API keys, then add https://app.hermoso.ai/mcp to Claude Code with an Authorization: Bearer header. Then connect TikTok inside Hermoso under Settings → Connectors, which is an OAuth consent screen in a browser. After that Claude Code publishes to TikTok as an ordinary tool call.

Can Claude Code post a carousel to TikTok?

Yes — a TikTok photo post takes up to 35 images, in the order you pass them, and the order is the slideshow. Video cannot be mixed in. Claude Code calls the same publish tool either way, and a channel that cannot carry a carousel is refused with the real reason attached.

Can Claude Code schedule a TikTok post for later?

Yes. schedule_post queues it on one calendar shared with every other channel, with a per-channel caption if the copy should differ, and list_scheduled and cancel_scheduled read and pull it back. TikTok is one of the eight channels that queue.

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