From 392df2d68c76a1755cdb3cce571b17cfaf3cb9f1 Mon Sep 17 00:00:00 2001
From: Pranav RK <39577726+radar07@users.noreply.github.com>
Date: Sat, 7 Jun 2025 23:08:38 +0530
Subject: [PATCH] docs: add `read-only` instruction to readme (#490)

---
 README.md | 17 +++++++++++++++++
 1 file changed, 17 insertions(+)

diff --git a/README.md b/README.md
index a17bf4351..9dba301d3 100644
--- a/README.md
+++ b/README.md
@@ -219,6 +219,23 @@ docker run -i --rm \
   ghcr.io/github/github-mcp-server
 ```
 
+## Read-Only Mode
+
+To run the server in read-only mode, you can use the `--read-only` flag. This will only offer read-only tools, preventing any modifications to repositories, issues, pull requests, etc.
+
+```bash
+./github-mcp-server --read-only
+```
+
+When using Docker, you can pass the read-only mode as an environment variable:
+
+```bash
+docker run -i --rm \
+  -e GITHUB_PERSONAL_ACCESS_TOKEN=<your-token> \
+  -e GITHUB_READ_ONLY=1 \
+  ghcr.io/github/github-mcp-server
+```
+
 ## GitHub Enterprise Server and Enterprise Cloud with data residency (ghe.com)
 
 The flag `--gh-host` and the environment variable `GITHUB_HOST` can be used to set