MCP100 verdict
Recommended official MCP SDK for Python when you need direct, first-party protocol support for building MCP clients or servers.
MCP100 Assessment
Editorial verdict
Reviewed September 11, 2026
Task Fit
Mapped
Developer workflows
Trust
Reviewed
A dated editorial review is published on the MCP detail page.
Maintenance
Activity observed
A dated repository or package update is available; editorial maintenance review is still pending.
Popularity
Signals available
Visible usage signals are shown for discovery only, not as proof of safety.
Evidence scope
24.3k MCP repository stars
No MCP-specific package metric is stored
Stars observed September 11, 2026 · Downloads observation date unavailable
Publisher activity observed September 10, 2026
Current source snapshot
Source relationship: First-party MCP
Reviewed September 11, 2026
Evidence-backed setup
This profile has type-appropriate, source-backed setup rather than an MCP-server client connector configuration.
Type-appropriate, source-backed setup for this sdk profile.
uv add "mcp[cli]"Capability
Recommended official MCP SDK for Python when you need direct, first-party protocol support for building MCP clients or servers.
First-party Python protocol primitives for exposing MCP server capabilities.
First-party Python client primitives for connecting to MCP servers.
Use the current official SDK line for MCP negotiation, requests, notifications, and supported transports.
This is an SDK, not a fixed MCP server tool catalog.
Not measured yet
Estimated token footprint of the MCP tool schemas exposed to the agent.
Reviewed access
Review the exact access boundary before connecting this MCP to accounts, credentials, or sensitive data.
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Model Context Protocol project is listed as First-party MCP in MCP100’s current evidence.
Current official resources:
Original product, capability, tool, and usage documentation from the MCP publisher. Installation sections appear under Install & Agents.
Python implementation of the Model Context Protocol (MCP)
[!NOTE] This is v2 of the MCP Python SDK, the current stable release line. It is a major rework of the SDK, both to support the 2026-07-28 MCP specification (and every earlier revision) and to fix long-standing architectural issues. Coming from v1? See What's new in v2 for the tour of what changed and the migration guide for every breaking change.
Not ready to migrate? v1.x lives on the
v1.xbranch, continues to receive critical bug fixes and security patches, and is documented at https://py.sdk.modelcontextprotocol.io/v1/. Sincepip install mcpnow installs 2.x, keep a<2upper bound on your requirement (for examplemcp>=1.28,<2) until you've migrated.Something rough, confusing, or broken? Open an issue or find us in #python-sdk-dev on the MCP Contributors Discord.
The documentation lives at https://py.sdk.modelcontextprotocol.io/.
It has a Get started guide, What's new in v2, the API reference, and the migration guide.
The Model Context Protocol lets you build servers that expose data and functionality to LLM applications in a secure, standardized way. Think of it like a web API, but designed for LLM interactions. With this SDK you can:
Python 3.10+.
Create a server.py:
from mcp.server import MCPServer
mcp = MCPServer("Demo")
@mcp.tool()
def add(a: int, b: int) -> int:
"""Add two numbers."""
return a + b
@mcp.resource("greeting://{name}")
def greeting(name: str) -> str:
"""Greet someone by name."""
return f"Hello, {name}!"
Full example: docs_src/index/tutorial001.py
That's a complete MCP server: one tool, one templated resource. Open it in the MCP Inspector:
uv run mcp dev server.py
Call add with a=1, b=2 and you get 3 back.
Notice what you did not write: no JSON Schema (a: int, b: int is the schema), no request parsing, no validation code, no protocol handling. Two type-hinted Python functions and a docstring.
Get started takes it from here.
The same package is a full MCP client. Serve server.py over HTTP:
uv run mcp run server.py --transport streamable-http
then point a Client at it:
import asyncio
from mcp import Client
async def main() -> None:
async with Client("http://localhost:8000/mcp") as client:
result = await client.call_tool("add", {"a": 1, "b": 2})
print(result.structured_content) # {'result': 3}
asyncio.run(main())
A URL means Streamable HTTP, the transport you deploy. Client can also launch a local server as a stdio subprocess or take any custom transport; Clients has the rest.
We are passionate about supporting contributors of all levels of experience and would love to see you get involved in the project. See the contributing guide to get started.
This project is licensed under the MIT License. See the LICENSE file for details.