generated: '2026-08-13'
method: searched
source: >-
  https://github.com/googleads/google-ads-doctor (repository metadata and README read via
  the GitHub API on 2026-08-13) and the googleads GitHub organization listing
provider: Google Ads
providerId: google-ads
description: >-
  Google publishes no general-purpose command line client for the Google Ads API. There is
  no `gcloud ads`, no `googleads` binary, nothing that lets an operator query or mutate an
  account from a shell without writing code against a client library. The one first-party
  command line tool that exists is a credential diagnostic, and it has been archived since
  2022. This is recorded as an honest absence, not a gap invented to fill a field.
general_purpose_cli: false
tools:
  - name: oauthdoctor
    repository: https://github.com/googleads/google-ads-doctor
    language: Go
    license: Apache-2.0
    official: true
    status: archived
    last_pushed: '2022-04-12'
    stars: 35
    purpose: >-
      Verifies a Google Ads client OAuth 2.0 environment and reports anomalies. Vets the
      client library configuration file, checks connectivity to the Google Ads host, and
      runs the installed-application or web OAuth 2.0 flow, rewriting a valid refresh
      token back into the config file when the existing one is invalid.
    install:
      - method: prebuilt binary
        note: >-
          Fetch the repository and use the binary under oauthdoctor/bin for Darwin, Linux
          or Windows.
      - method: source
        note: Build from source with Go, per the repository README.
    commands:
      note: >-
        Single-purpose diagnostic binary rather than a command tree. It operates on the
        client library configuration file for a chosen language.
    caveat: >-
      The repository is ARCHIVED and was last pushed 2022-04-12 — four years and roughly
      sixteen API versions before v25. Its diagnostics predate current OAuth guidance and
      the ADC-based setup Google's own MCP server documents. Treat it as historical.
alternatives:
  - name: Client library interactive examples
    note: >-
      Each first-party client library ships runnable examples (Python's
      generate_user_credentials.py, the .NET and Java sample runners) that cover the
      authentication bootstrap oauthdoctor was written for.
    see: packages/google-ads-packages.yml
  - name: gcloud auth application-default login
    note: >-
      The current documented path to credentials, using the Google Cloud CLI with
      --scopes https://www.googleapis.com/auth/adwords. gcloud is a Google Cloud tool, not
      a Google Ads one, and exposes no Google Ads operations.
  - name: Google Ads MCP server
    note: >-
      Launched from a shell via pipx, and the closest thing to an interactive command line
      against the API today — but it is an agent surface, read-only, and requires an MCP
      client to drive it.
    see: mcp/google-ads-mcp.yml
  - name: Google Ads Scripts
    note: >-
      Browser-hosted JavaScript automation inside the Google Ads UI. Not installable, not
      scriptable from a terminal.
    see: https://developers.google.com/google-ads/scripts/docs/start