Registry

The MCP server registry is a public directory of MCP servers. mcp can search it and add servers directly from it.

Searching

mcp search filesystem

[
  {
    "name": "filesystem",
    "description": "MCP server for file system operations",
    "repository": "https://github.com/anthropics/mcp-servers",
    "install": ["npx @anthropic/fs-mcp-server"]
  }
]

Search with multiple words:

mcp search "database sql"

Results include:

• name — Server identifier (used with mcp add)
• description — What the server does
• repository — Source code link
• install — How to install/run (runtime + package)

Adding from registry

mcp add filesystem

What happens:

1. Searches the registry for a server named filesystem
2. Reads the server metadata (command, args, env vars)
3. Generates a config entry in ~/.config/mcp/servers.json
4. Prints which environment variables you need to set

✓ Server "filesystem" added to /home/you/.config/mcp/servers.json

Configure the following environment variables:
  ALLOWED_PATHS  — Directories the server can access

Run to test:
  mcp filesystem --list

What gets generated

For a package-based server (most common), the config looks like:

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "filesystem": {
      "command": "npx",
      "args": ["-y", "@anthropic/fs-mcp-server"],
      "env": {
        "ALLOWED_PATHS": "${ALLOWED_PATHS}"
      }
    }
  }
}

For a remote server with HTTP transport:

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "remote-service": {
      "url": "https://example.com/mcp/sse"
    }
  }
}

The registry entry determines which type is used. Packages (stdio) take priority over remotes (HTTP).

Already exists?

If you try to add a server that's already in your config:

mcp add filesystem

error: server "filesystem" already exists in config

Remove it first if you want to re-add:

mcp remove filesystem
mcp add filesystem

If you only want to pull fresh metadata from the registry (new package version, new env vars, updated args), use mcp update <name> instead — it preserves your customizations (filled env values, headers, idle_timeout, etc.). See mcp update.

Manual HTTP servers

For servers not in the registry, add them manually:

mcp add --url https://mcp.example.com/sse my-server

This creates a minimal HTTP entry:

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "my-server": {
      "url": "https://mcp.example.com/sse"
    }
  }
}