How to integrate Zerobounce MCP with OpenAI Agents SDK

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Introduction

This guide walks you through connecting Zerobounce to the OpenAI Agents SDK using the Composio tool router. By the end, you'll have a working Zerobounce agent that can validate a list of 100 new signups, score this email for lead quality, check deliverability of mark@gmail.com, get activity data for a specific email through natural language commands.

This guide will help you understand how to give your OpenAI Agents SDK agent real control over a Zerobounce account through Composio's Zerobounce MCP server.

Before we dive in, let's take a quick look at the key ideas and tools involved.

TL;DR

Here's what you'll learn:
  • Get and set up your OpenAI and Composio API keys
  • Install the necessary dependencies
  • Initialize Composio and create a Tool Router session for Zerobounce
  • Configure an AI agent that can use Zerobounce as a tool
  • Run a live chat session where you can ask the agent to perform Zerobounce operations

What is open-ai-agents-sdk?

The OpenAI Agents SDK is a lightweight framework for building AI agents that can use tools and maintain conversation state. It provides a simple interface for creating agents with hosted MCP tool support.

Key features include:

  • Hosted MCP Tools: Connect to external services through hosted MCP endpoints
  • SQLite Sessions: Persist conversation history across interactions
  • Simple API: Clean interface with Agent, Runner, and tool configuration
  • Streaming Support: Real-time response streaming for interactive applications

What is the Zerobounce MCP server, and what's possible with it?

The Zerobounce MCP server is an implementation of the Model Context Protocol that connects your AI agent and assistants like Claude, Cursor, etc directly to your Zerobounce account. It provides structured and secure access to your email validation and deliverability tools, so your agent can perform actions like validating emails, scoring leads, managing bulk jobs, and analyzing engagement—all automatically.

  • Real-time email validation: Instantly check if email addresses are valid, risky, or undeliverable before sending campaigns or updating your lists.
  • Bulk validation and processing: Upload files and process hundreds of emails or domains at once, with tools for tracking job status and retrieving results.
  • AI-powered lead scoring: Score individual email addresses using Zerobounce AI to assess lead quality and prioritize outreach.
  • Domain and pattern analysis: Identify common email address formats for any domain or run bulk domain searches to optimize your contact strategies.
  • Allowlist and blocklist management: Easily update your allow and block lists to fine-tune which addresses pass or fail validation, keeping your lists clean and secure.

Supported Tools & Triggers

Tools
Get Activity DataTool to get activity data (opens, clicks, etc.
AI Scoring Single EmailTool to score a single email address using zerobounce ai.
Allow or Block ListTool to manage allowlist and blocklist for email validation.
Batch Validate EmailsTool to validate a batch of email addresses in real time.
Delete fileTool to delete a file that was submitted for bulk validation.
Domain Search File StatusTool to get the processing status of a file submitted for bulk domain search.
Domain Search Get FileTool to download the results file for a completed bulk domain search job.
Domain Search Send FileTool to upload a file for bulk domain search.
Domain Search SingleTool to identify common email address formats for a given domain.
Delete Email Finder FileTool to delete a file that was submitted for bulk email finding.
Email Finder File StatusTool to get the processing status of a file submitted for bulk email finding.
Email Finder Send FileTool to upload a file for bulk email finding.
Email Finder SingleTool to find an email address for a given person and domain.
Get API UsageTool to retrieve api usage statistics for a given period.
Get Credit BalanceTool to retrieve your current zerobounce email validation credit balance.
List EvaluatorTool to evaluate the quality of an email list.
Send FileTool to upload a file for bulk email validation.
Validate EmailTool to validate a single email address in real time.

What is the Composio tool router, and how does it fit here?

What is Tool Router?

Composio's Tool Router helps agents find the right tools for a task at runtime. You can plug in multiple toolkits (like Gmail, HubSpot, and GitHub), and the agent will identify the relevant app and action to complete multi-step workflows. This can reduce token usage and improve the reliability of tool calls. Read more here: Getting started with Tool Router

The tool router generates a secure MCP URL that your agents can access to perform actions.

How the Tool Router works

The Tool Router follows a three-phase workflow:

  1. Discovery: Searches for tools matching your task and returns relevant toolkits with their details.
  2. Authentication: Checks for active connections. If missing, creates an auth config and returns a connection URL via Auth Link.
  3. Execution: Executes the action using the authenticated connection.

Step-by-step Guide

Prerequisites

Before starting, make sure you have:
  • Composio API Key and OpenAI API Key
  • Primary know-how of OpenAI Agents SDK
  • A live Zerobounce project
  • Some knowledge of Python or Typescript

Getting API Keys for OpenAI and Composio

OpenAI API Key
  • Go to the OpenAI dashboard and create an API key. You'll need credits to use the models, or you can connect to another model provider.
  • Keep the API key safe.
Composio API Key

Install dependencies

pip install composio_openai_agents openai-agents python-dotenv

Install the Composio SDK and the OpenAI Agents SDK.

Set up environment variables

bash
OPENAI_API_KEY=sk-...your-api-key
COMPOSIO_API_KEY=your-api-key
USER_ID=composio_user@gmail.com

Create a .env file and add your OpenAI and Composio API keys.

Import dependencies

import asyncio
import os
from dotenv import load_dotenv

from composio import Composio
from composio_openai_agents import OpenAIAgentsProvider
from agents import Agent, Runner, HostedMCPTool, SQLiteSession
What's happening:
  • You're importing all necessary libraries.
  • The Composio and OpenAIAgentsProvider classes are imported to connect your OpenAI agent to Composio tools like Zerobounce.

Set up the Composio instance

load_dotenv()

api_key = os.getenv("COMPOSIO_API_KEY")
user_id = os.getenv("USER_ID")

if not api_key:
    raise RuntimeError("COMPOSIO_API_KEY is not set. Create a .env file with COMPOSIO_API_KEY=your_key")

# Initialize Composio
composio = Composio(api_key=api_key, provider=OpenAIAgentsProvider())
What's happening:
  • load_dotenv() loads your .env file so OPENAI_API_KEY and COMPOSIO_API_KEY are available as environment variables.
  • Creating a Composio instance using the API Key and OpenAIAgentsProvider class.

Create a Tool Router session

# Create a Zerobounce Tool Router session
session = composio.create(
    user_id=user_id,
    toolkits=["zerobounce"]
)

mcp_url = session.mcp.url

What is happening:

  • You give the Tool Router the user id and the toolkits you want available. Here, it is only zerobounce.
  • The router checks the user's Zerobounce connection and prepares the MCP endpoint.
  • The returned session.mcp.url is the MCP URL that your agent will use to access Zerobounce.
  • This approach keeps things lightweight and lets the agent request Zerobounce tools only when needed during the conversation.

Configure the agent

# Configure agent with MCP tool
agent = Agent(
    name="Assistant",
    model="gpt-5",
    instructions=(
        "You are a helpful assistant that can access Zerobounce. "
        "Help users perform Zerobounce operations through natural language."
    ),
    tools=[
        HostedMCPTool(
            tool_config={
                "type": "mcp",
                "server_label": "tool_router",
                "server_url": mcp_url,
                "headers": {"x-api-key": api_key},
                "require_approval": "never",
            }
        )
    ],
)
What's happening:
  • We're creating an Agent instance with a name, model (gpt-5), and clear instructions about its purpose.
  • The agent's instructions tell it that it can access Zerobounce and help with queries, inserts, updates, authentication, and fetching database information.
  • The tools array includes a HostedMCPTool that connects to the MCP server URL we created earlier.
  • The headers dict includes the Composio API key for secure authentication with the MCP server.
  • require_approval: 'never' means the agent can execute Zerobounce operations without asking for permission each time, making interactions smoother.

Start chat loop and handle conversation

print("\nComposio Tool Router session created.")

chat_session = SQLiteSession("conversation_openai_toolrouter")

print("\nChat started. Type your requests below.")
print("Commands: 'exit', 'quit', or 'q' to end\n")

async def main():
    try:
        result = await Runner.run(
            agent,
            "What can you help me with?",
            session=chat_session
        )
        print(f"Assistant: {result.final_output}\n")
    except Exception as e:
        print(f"Error: {e}\n")

    while True:
        user_input = input("You: ").strip()
        if user_input.lower() in {"exit", "quit", "q"}:
            print("Goodbye!")
            break

        result = await Runner.run(
            agent,
            user_input,
            session=chat_session
        )
        print(f"Assistant: {result.final_output}\n")

asyncio.run(main())
What's happening:
  • The program prints a session URL that you visit to authorize Zerobounce.
  • After authorization, the chat begins.
  • Each message you type is processed by the agent using Runner.run().
  • The responses are printed to the console, and conversations are saved locally using SQLite.
  • Typing exit, quit, or q cleanly ends the chat.

Complete Code

Here's the complete code to get you started with Zerobounce and open-ai-agents-sdk:

import asyncio
import os
from dotenv import load_dotenv

from composio import Composio
from composio_openai_agents import OpenAIAgentsProvider
from agents import Agent, Runner, HostedMCPTool, SQLiteSession

load_dotenv()

api_key = os.getenv("COMPOSIO_API_KEY")
user_id = os.getenv("USER_ID")

if not api_key:
    raise RuntimeError("COMPOSIO_API_KEY is not set. Create a .env file with COMPOSIO_API_KEY=your_key")

# Initialize Composio
composio = Composio(api_key=api_key, provider=OpenAIAgentsProvider())

# Create Tool Router session
session = composio.create(
    user_id=user_id,
    toolkits=["zerobounce"]
)
mcp_url = session.mcp.url

# Configure agent with MCP tool
agent = Agent(
    name="Assistant",
    model="gpt-5",
    instructions=(
        "You are a helpful assistant that can access Zerobounce. "
        "Help users perform Zerobounce operations through natural language."
    ),
    tools=[
        HostedMCPTool(
            tool_config={
                "type": "mcp",
                "server_label": "tool_router",
                "server_url": mcp_url,
                "headers": {"x-api-key": api_key},
                "require_approval": "never",
            }
        )
    ],
)

print("\nComposio Tool Router session created.")

chat_session = SQLiteSession("conversation_openai_toolrouter")

print("\nChat started. Type your requests below.")
print("Commands: 'exit', 'quit', or 'q' to end\n")

async def main():
    try:
        result = await Runner.run(
            agent,
            "What can you help me with?",
            session=chat_session
        )
        print(f"Assistant: {result.final_output}\n")
    except Exception as e:
        print(f"Error: {e}\n")

    while True:
        user_input = input("You: ").strip()
        if user_input.lower() in {"exit", "quit", "q"}:
            print("Goodbye!")
            break

        result = await Runner.run(
            agent,
            user_input,
            session=chat_session
        )
        print(f"Assistant: {result.final_output}\n")

asyncio.run(main())

Conclusion

This was a starter code for integrating Zerobounce MCP with OpenAI Agents SDK to build a functional AI agent that can interact with Zerobounce.

Key features:

  • Hosted MCP tool integration through Composio's Tool Router
  • SQLite session persistence for conversation history
  • Simple async chat loop for interactive testing
You can extend this by adding more toolkits, implementing custom business logic, or building a web interface around the agent.

How to build Zerobounce MCP Agent with another framework

FAQ

What are the differences in Tool Router MCP and Zerobounce MCP?

With a standalone Zerobounce MCP server, the agents and LLMs can only access a fixed set of Zerobounce tools tied to that server. However, with the Composio Tool Router, agents can dynamically load tools from Zerobounce and many other apps based on the task at hand, all through a single MCP endpoint.

Can I use Tool Router MCP with OpenAI Agents SDK?

Yes, you can. OpenAI Agents SDK fully supports MCP integration. You get structured tool calling, message history handling, and model orchestration while Tool Router takes care of discovering and serving the right Zerobounce tools.

Can I manage the permissions and scopes for Zerobounce while using Tool Router?

Yes, absolutely. You can configure which Zerobounce scopes and actions are allowed when connecting your account to Composio. You can also bring your own OAuth credentials or API configuration so you keep full control over what the agent can do.

How safe is my data with Composio Tool Router?

All sensitive data such as tokens, keys, and configuration is fully encrypted at rest and in transit. Composio is SOC 2 Type 2 compliant and follows strict security practices so your Zerobounce data and credentials are handled as safely as possible.

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Context
ASU
Letta
glean
HubSpot
Agent.ai
Altera
DataStax
Entelligence
Rolai
Context
ASU
Letta
glean
HubSpot
Agent.ai
Altera
DataStax
Entelligence
Rolai

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