mcp-use is a TypeScript framework for building Model Context Protocol (MCP) servers and MCP Apps, including ChatGPT apps and Claude connectors. You define tools with Zod input and output schemas on an MCPServer, and the types flow through to structured results, React view props, and tool calls. A tool can bind a React view by name, so the same server returns an interactive UI when a host such as ChatGPT renders it.
A create-mcp-use-app scaffold produces the server, TypeScript configuration, development scripts, and a React view pipeline. In development the MCP endpoint serves a landing page with its connection URL, and an Inspector at /mcp/inspector lets you invoke tools and inspect views in the browser. A CLI does the same headlessly: connect to a server, list and call tools, and capture a view screenshot. A built-in tunnel exposes the local server to ChatGPT and Claude before deployment, and npm run deploy ships to the Manufact platform, with a self-hosting guide as the alternative.
The framework builds on the official TypeScript SDK v2 and tracks the MCP 2026 protocol. Companion packages cover clients for Node.js, browsers, and React, model-powered agents on top of MCP clients, the Inspector, tunnelling, and a Python edition for servers, clients, and agents.
Features
- Typed tools: Zod schemas define inputs and outputs and type the view props and tool calls
- Native views: React components bind directly to tools for interactive MCP Apps without extension wiring
- Inspector: browser UI and headless CLI for invoking tools, validating inputs, and inspecting views
- Screenshot CLI: captures a rendered view for a given tool call from the terminal
- Tunneling: mcp-use dev --tunnel publishes a local server for testing in ChatGPT and Claude
- OAuth adapters: one-line authentication adapters for hosted servers
- Deployment: npm run deploy to Manufact with observability, analytics, and preview environments, or self-host
- Client and agent packages: @mcp-use/client connects from Node.js, browsers, and sandboxes; @mcp-use/agent builds agents on MCP clients
- Python edition: mcp-use on PyPI for Python servers, clients, and agents
