Remote MCP servers
A remote MCP server is one the vendor runs for you: a URL, a sign-in screen, and you're connected. It's the difference between installing software and opening a tab — and it's where the official half of the MCP ecosystem is heading.
Remote vs local
| Remote | Local | |
|---|---|---|
| runs | On the vendor's servers | On your machine, as a subprocess |
| setup | Paste a URL, sign in | Configure a launch command + API key |
| auth | OAuth grant, revocable at the vendor | API key in an env var, yours to manage |
| updates | Vendor's job — always current | Yours — npx -y re-resolves, pinned versions don't |
| reach | The vendor's API only | Whatever the process can touch — filesystem included |
What connecting feels like
- You give your client the server URL —
https://mcp.linear.app/mcp, say. - The client opens the vendor's own sign-in page in your browser.
- A consent screen lists what the server will be able to do; you approve.
- The client holds a short-lived OAuth token from then on — no key to paste, and the grant is revocable from the vendor's dashboard.
That flow is the MCP spec's OAuth 2.1 authorization model, and it's the main practical argument for remote servers — the security story is covered in our MCP security guide.
Client support
Every major client speaks streamable HTTP now; only the config key differs. Claude takes
remote servers as custom connectors (paid plans), ChatGPT is remote-only, Cursor and VS Code take a url in their JSON config, Codex CLI a url in TOML, Windsurf a serverUrl, and Gemini CLI an httpUrl.
Every remote server we track (96)
Each of these is a vendor-hosted endpoint we've verified against the vendor's own documentation — the verdict page has the receipt and copy-paste config per client:
| Brand | Endpoint | Verdict |
|---|---|---|
| fal.ai | https://docs.fal.ai/mcp | Official |
| Atlassian | https://mcp.atlassian.com/v1/mcp | Official |
| Datadog | https://mcp.datadoghq.com/v1/mcp | Official |
| Buffer | https://mcp.buffer.com/mcp | Official |
| Google Drive | https://drivemcp.googleapis.com/mcp/v1 | Official |
| Confluence | https://mcp.atlassian.com/v1/mcp | Official |
| Slack | https://mcp.slack.com/mcp | Official |
| Perplexity | https://api.perplexity.ai/mcp | Official |
| https://mcp.facebook.com/ads | Official | |
| Tavily | https://mcp.tavily.com/mcp/ | Official |
| Exa | https://mcp.exa.ai/mcp | Official |
| Bright Data | https://mcp.brightdata.com/mcp | Official |
| Context7 | https://mcp.context7.com/mcp | Official |
| Excalidraw | https://api.excalidraw.com/api/v1/mcp | Official |
| Canva | https://mcp.canva.com/mcp | Official |
| Google Sheets | https://sheetsmcp.googleapis.com/mcp/v1 | Official |
| Asana | https://mcp.asana.com/v2/mcp | Official |
| Robinhood | https://agent.robinhood.com/mcp/trading | Official |
| Instantly | https://mcp.instantly.ai/mcp | Official |
| Vercel | https://mcp.vercel.com | Official |
| Tableau | https://mcp.tableau.com | Official |
| Todoist | https://ai.todoist.net/mcp | Official |
| Granola | https://mcp.granola.ai/mcp | Official |
| Power BI | https://api.fabric.microsoft.com/v1/mcp/powerbi/authoring | Official |
| monday.com | https://mcp.monday.com/mcp | Official |
| Gemini | https://gemini-api-docs-mcp.dev | Official |
| Miro | https://mcp.miro.com/ | Official |
| Notion | https://mcp.notion.com/mcp | Official |
| DeepWiki | https://mcp.deepwiki.com/mcp | Official |
| Google Stitch | https://stitch.googleapis.com/mcp | Official |
| Composio | https://connect.composio.dev/mcp | Official |
| GitHub | https://api.githubcopilot.com/mcp/ | Official |
| Higgsfield | https://mcp.higgsfield.ai/mcp | Official |
| Google Docs | https://docsmcp.googleapis.com/mcp/v1 | Official |
| Webflow | https://mcp.webflow.com/mcp | Official |
| PagerDuty | https://mcp.pagerduty.com/mcp | Official |
| Stripe | https://mcp.stripe.com | Official |
| Klaviyo | https://mcp.klaviyo.com/mcp | Official |
| BigQuery | https://bigquery.googleapis.com/mcp | Official |
| ClickHouse | https://mcp.clickhouse.cloud/mcp | Official |
| Shopify | https://{shop}.myshopify.com/api/mcp | Official |
| ClickUp | https://mcp.clickup.com/mcp | Official |
| Bitbucket | https://mcp.atlassian.com/v2/mcp | Official |
| Railway | https://mcp.railway.com | Official |
| Microsoft Learn | https://learn.microsoft.com/api/mcp | Official |
| Google Calendar | https://calendarmcp.googleapis.com/mcp/v1 | Official |
| Lucidchart | https://mcp.lucid.app/mcp | Official |
| Jira | https://mcp.atlassian.com/v1/mcp | Official |
| OpenAI | https://developers.openai.com/mcp | Official |
| Airtable | https://mcp.airtable.com/mcp | Official |
| Trello | https://mcp.trello.com/v1 | Official |
| Strava | https://mcp.strava.com/mcp | Official |
| Amplitude | https://mcp.amplitude.com/mcp | Official |
| Zoom | https://mcp.zoom.us/mcp/zoom/streamable | Official |
| HubSpot | https://mcp.hubspot.com | Official |
| Gmail | https://gmailmcp.googleapis.com/mcp/v1 | Official |
| Kagi | https://mcp.kagi.com/mcp | Official |
| Vanta | https://mcp.vanta.com/mcp | Official |
| Attio | https://mcp.attio.com/mcp | Official |
| Greenhouse | https://mcp.greenhouse.io/mcp | Official |
| Gong | https://mcp.gong.io/mcp | Official |
| Zapier | https://mcp.zapier.com | Official |
| Linear | https://mcp.linear.app/mcp | Official |
| TickTick | https://mcp.ticktick.com | Official |
| Plaid | https://api.dashboard.plaid.com/mcp/ | Official |
| SonarQube | https://api.sonarcloud.io/mcp | Official |
| Pipedrive | https://mcp.pipedrive.ai/mcp | Official |
| Resend | https://mcp.resend.com/mcp | Official |
| Neon | https://mcp.neon.tech/mcp | Official |
| Coda | https://coda.io/apis/mcp | Official |
| Langfuse | https://cloud.langfuse.com/api/public/mcp | Official |
| Render | https://mcp.render.com/mcp | Official |
| Clerk | https://mcp.clerk.com/mcp | Official |
| Workato | https://app.workato.com/mcp | Official |
| Dropbox | https://mcp.dropbox.com/mcp | Official |
| Twilio | https://mcp.twilio.com/docs | Official |
| Mem0 | https://mcp.mem0.ai/mcp | Official |
| Braintrust | https://api.braintrust.dev/mcp | Official |
| RevenueCat | https://mcp.revenuecat.ai/mcp | Official |
| Honeycomb | https://mcp.honeycomb.io/mcp | Official |
| New Relic | https://mcp.newrelic.com/mcp/ | Official |
| Hex | https://app.hex.tech/mcp | Official |
| Fullstory | https://api.fullstory.com/mcp/fullstory | Official |
| Apollo.io | https://mcp.apollo.io/mcp | Official |
| Svelte | https://mcp.svelte.dev/mcp | Official |
| PayPal | https://mcp.paypal.com | Official |
| Amazon | https://advertising-ai.amazon.com/mcp | Official |
| Mailchimp | https://mandrillapp.com/mcp | Official |
| Calendly | https://mcp.calendly.com | Official |
| Tailscale | https://tailscale.mcp.kapa.ai/ | Official |
| Substack | https://mcp.substack.com/api/v1/mcp | Official |
| Coinbase | https://docs.cdp.coinbase.com/mcp | Official |
| Etsy | https://mcp.api.etsycloud.com/mcp | Official |
| Brevo | https://mcp.brevo.com/v1/brevo/mcp | Official |
| Wolfram|Alpha | https://agenttools.wolfram.com/mcp | Official |
| CoinGate Gift Cards | https://mcp.eu.algolia.com/1/xe5UKTfUQlyUr3Hs4nkiiA/mcp | Official |
Questions
What is a remote MCP server?
An MCP server the vendor hosts at a public URL, reached over streamable HTTP. You paste the URL into your client and sign in with OAuth — no package to install, no API key to manage, no process running on your machine.
Are remote MCP servers safer than local ones?
Generally yes, for official ones: the vendor runs and patches the code, auth is an OAuth grant you can revoke from their dashboard, and your password never touches a config file. The trade-off is that your requests flow through the vendor's infrastructure — which for an official server they already did.
Which clients support remote MCP servers?
Effectively all current ones: Claude (claude.ai, Desktop and Code), ChatGPT — which supports only remote servers — Cursor, VS Code with Copilot, Codex CLI, Windsurf and Gemini CLI. The config key differs per client (url, serverUrl or httpUrl), but the server is the same.
Can I turn a local MCP server into a remote one?
Not by flipping a switch — a local stdio server has to be hosted somewhere and exposed over streamable HTTP, which is what MCP gateways do. That puts a third party in the path of your credentials, so it's a last resort when a client (like ChatGPT) can't run the server locally.