macos-mcp

Overview

macOS-MCP is a lightweight, open-source Model Context Protocol server that bridges AI agents and the macOS operating system. It enables seamless automation of macOS through LLMs via tasks such as file navigation, application control, UI interaction, browser automation, and system operations.

Supported Operating Systems

• macOS 12 (Monterey)

• macOS 13 (Ventura)

• macOS 14 (Sonoma)

• macOS 15 (Sequoia)

Key Features

• Works with Any LLM (Vision Optional)
  Unlike traditional automation tools, macOS-MCP doesn't require computer vision, fine-tuned models, or specialized setup. Works seamlessly with any LLM—Claude, GPT, Gemini, or others.

• Native macOS Integration
  Interacts natively with macOS UI elements using the Accessibility API. Opens apps, controls windows, simulates user input, and captures desktop state without workarounds.

• Rich Toolset for Automation
  Complete toolkit for keyboard/mouse operations, window management, UI state capture, interactive element extraction from the accessibility tree, and AppleScript execution.

• Lightweight and Open-Source
  Minimal dependencies with full source code available under MIT license. Easy setup and deployment.

• Smart Context Awareness
  Automatically detects application state (Launchpad, Control Center, Spotlight). Scans menu bar, dock, desktop, and system UI elements intelligently.

• Customizable and Extensible
  Easily extend with custom tools or modify behavior to suit your specific automation needs.

Installation

Prerequisites

• Python: 3.11 or later

• UV Package Manager: Install with pip install uv or curl -LsSf https://astral.sh/uv/install.sh | sh

• macOS: 12 (Monterey) or later

• Accessibility Permissions: Required for UI element interaction

Quick Start

Run the server directly:

uvx macos-mcp

# Or with SSE/Streamable HTTP for network access
uvx macos-mcp --transport sse --host localhost --port 8000
uvx macos-mcp --transport streamable-http --host localhost --port 8000

Run it as a background service that starts now and at every login:

macos-mcp install

# Or choose the HTTP transport and bind address explicitly
macos-mcp install --transport sse --host 127.0.0.1 --port 8000

This installs a launchd Launch Agent at ~/Library/LaunchAgents/com.macos-mcp.server.plist. Use macos-mcp uninstall to remove it. Logs are written to ~/.macos-mcp/server.log and ~/.macos-mcp/server.error.log.

Transport Options

Grant Required Permissions

macOS-MCP requires Accessibility and Screen Recording permissions to function properly.

Accessibility Permissions

1. Open System Settings → Privacy & Security → Accessibility

2. Click the lock icon and authenticate

3. Add the following applications:

   • Your terminal application (Terminal, iTerm2, VS Code, etc.)

   • Python (typically /usr/bin/python3 or the Python version managed by UV)

   • UV (~/.local/bin/uv if installed locally, or the Python environment UV manages)

4. Restart the terminal after granting permissions

For uvx users: Grant permissions to your terminal application and Python, as uvx runs Python packages from UV's cache.

Screen Recording Permissions

The Snapshot tool requires Screen Recording permissions to capture screenshots:

1. Open System Settings → Privacy & Security → Screen Recording

2. Click the lock icon and authenticate

3. Add the same applications as above (terminal, Python, UV)

4. Restart the terminal after granting permissions

Note: If the Snapshot tool fails, verify both permissions are granted in System Settings.

Integration Options

1. Install Claude Desktop

2. Edit ~/Library/Application Support/Claude/claude_desktop_config.json:

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "macos-mcp": {
      "command": "uvx",
      "args": ["macos-mcp"]
    }
  }
}

3. Restart Claude Desktop

1. Install Gemini CLI:

npm install -g @google/gemini-cli

2. Navigate to ~/.gemini and open settings.json

3. Add the server config:

{
  "theme": "Default",
  "mcpServers": {
    "macos-mcp": {
      "command": "uvx",
      "args": ["macos-mcp"]
    }
  }
}

4. Restart Gemini CLI

1. Install Claude Code

2. Add to your project configuration or use the MCP marketplace integration

Pi does not ship with built-in MCP support, but macOS-MCP can be installed as a Pi package. The package starts this MCP server over stdio and exposes convenient Pi tools that wrap the existing macOS-MCP tools.

One-line global setup:

pi install git:github.com/CursorTouch/MacOS-MCP

After install, restart Pi or run:

/reload

Try without installing:

pi -e git:github.com/CursorTouch/MacOS-MCP

Local checkout setup:

git clone https://github.com/CursorTouch/MacOS-MCP.git
cd MacOS-MCP
uv sync
npm install
pi

If you copied only the extension into another Pi project, run Pi from the macOS-MCP checkout or set:

export MACOS_MCP_ROOT=/path/to/MacOS-MCP

The extension exposes these Pi tools:

Recommended agent workflow:

• Call mac_snapshot first.

• Use the coordinates returned by Snapshot with mac_click, mac_type, and mac_scroll.

• Use screenshots/vision only when Accessibility data is missing or ambiguous.

The extension auto-detects the macOS-MCP checkout when installed as a Pi package. If you use a manually copied extension, set MACOS_MCP_ROOT=/path/to/MacOS-MCP.

Any client supporting the Model Context Protocol can integrate macOS-MCP by configuring the uvx macos-mcp command in their MCP server settings.

MCP Tools

macOS-MCP provides a comprehensive toolset for desktop automation:

Limitations

• Accessibility Requirements: Manual permission grant required in System Preferences

• App Compatibility: Some applications have limited or no Accessibility API support

• Performance Variance: Complex UIs with many elements may have slower traversal

• Text Input: Some specialized input fields may not properly receive keystrokes

• Authentication: Cannot interact with system authentication dialogs

Security & Access Control

Authentication

macos-mcp --transport sse --host 0.0.0.0 --auth-key "your_token"

Requires Authorization: Bearer your_token header on all requests.

IP Allowlist

macos-mcp --auth-key "token" --ip-allowlist "203.0.113.0/24,198.51.100.5"

Restricts connections to specified CIDR ranges.

TLS/HTTPS

openssl req -x509 -newkey rsa:4096 -keyout key.pem -out cert.pem -days 365 -nodes

macos-mcp --ssl-certfile cert.pem --ssl-keyfile key.pem

OAuth 2.0 + PKCE

For MCP clients that use OAuth (e.g. Claude Desktop) instead of a static API key:

macos-mcp --transport streamable-http --host 0.0.0.0 \
  --ssl-certfile ~/.macos-mcp/cert.pem \
  --ssl-keyfile  ~/.macos-mcp/key.pem \
  --oauth-client-id my-client \
  --oauth-client-secret my-secret

Claude Desktop config:

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "macos-mcp": {
      "type": "http",
      "url": "https://<host>:8000/mcp/",
      "oauth": {
        "clientId": "my-client",
        "clientSecret": "my-secret"
      }
    }
  }
}

The OAuth server exposes:

• GET /.well-known/oauth-authorization-server — server metadata (RFC 8414)

• GET /oauth/authorize — Authorization Code + PKCE (S256 required)

• POST /oauth/token — token exchange (client secret required)

• POST /oauth/register — disabled; clients must be pre-provisioned

Dynamic client registration is disabled. Redirect URIs must be loopback http(s) only. Auth key and OAuth can coexist — both are accepted as valid Bearer tokens.

SSRF Protection

The Scrape tool blocks: private IPs, loopback, link-local, credentials-in-URLs, non-HTTP schemes.

Config File (~/.macos-mcp/config.toml)

Instead of passing flags every time, store your configuration in ~/.macos-mcp/config.toml. CLI flags always override config file values.

Search order:

1. --config /path/to/config.toml

2. ~/.macos-mcp/config.toml

stdio — local only, no security needed:

[server]
transport = "stdio"

SSE — network access with auth and IP restriction:

[server]
transport = "sse"
host      = "0.0.0.0"
port      = 8000
auth_key  = "your-secret-key"

[security]
ip_allowlist = ["192.168.1.0/24"]

Streamable HTTP — network access with auth and TLS (recommended for production):

[server]
transport    = "streamable-http"
host         = "0.0.0.0"
port         = 8000
auth_key     = "your-secret-key"
ssl_certfile = "cert.pem"   # resolved relative to ~/.macos-mcp/
ssl_keyfile  = "key.pem"

[security]
ip_allowlist        = ["192.168.1.0/24"]
oauth_client_id     = "my-client"      # optional — enables OAuth 2.0 + PKCE
oauth_client_secret = "my-secret"

[tools]
exclude = ["Shell", "Scrape"]   # disable specific tools

Available tool names: App, Shell, Snapshot, Click, Type, Scroll, Move, Shortcut, Wait, Scrape, Notification

Place your cert and key files in the same directory:

~/.macos-mcp/
├── config.toml
├── cert.pem
└── key.pem

Generate a self-signed cert directly into that directory:

mkdir -p ~/.macos-mcp
openssl req -x509 -newkey rsa:4096 \
  -keyout ~/.macos-mcp/key.pem \
  -out ~/.macos-mcp/cert.pem \
  -days 365 -nodes

Environment Variables

All variables are optional. Set them via the env key in claude_desktop_config.json.

Example claude_desktop_config.json (remote with auth + TLS):

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "macos-mcp": {
      "command": "uvx",
      "args": ["macos-mcp", "--transport", "sse", "--host", "0.0.0.0"],
      "env": {
        "MACOS_MCP_AUTH_KEY": "your_token",
        "MACOS_MCP_IP_ALLOWLIST": "203.0.113.0/24",
        "MACOS_MCP_SSL_CERTFILE": "/path/to/cert.pem",
        "MACOS_MCP_SSL_KEYFILE": "/path/to/key.pem"
      }
    }
  }
}

Telemetry

macOS-MCP collects anonymous usage data to help improve the server. No personal information, tool arguments, or outputs are tracked.

To disable telemetry, set ANONYMIZED_TELEMETRY to false:

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "macos-mcp": {
      "command": "uvx",
      "args": ["macos-mcp"],
      "env": { "ANONYMIZED_TELEMETRY": "false" }
    }
  }
}

Security

⚠️ Important Security Notice: macOS-MCP operates with full Accessibility API permissions and executes real system operations without sandboxing. It can perform permanent, irreversible actions.

Before using macOS-MCP:

• ✅ Grant Accessibility permissions only to trusted applications

• ✅ Understand that Shell commands execute with full user privileges

• ✅ Review AI-generated action plans before execution

• ✅ Use only in virtual machines or isolated environments with valueless data

• ✅ Create backups before testing in production-like scenarios

⛔ Do NOT use on:

• Systems with irreplaceable data

• Production machines or shared systems

• Compliance-regulated environments (HIPAA, PCI, etc.)

For detailed security guidance, see SECURITY.md.

Contributing

We welcome contributions! Please see CONTRIBUTING.md for:

• Development setup and code standards

• Testing requirements

• Pull request process

• Coding conventions (Ruff formatting, 100 char line length)

License

macOS-MCP is licensed under the MIT License - see LICENSE for details.

Acknowledgements

macOS-MCP is built with excellent open-source projects:

• PyObjC - Python to Objective-C bridge

• Pillow - Python Imaging Library

• FastMCP - MCP framework

• macOS Accessibility API (ApplicationServices)

Citation

If you use macOS-MCP in your research or project, please cite:

@software{macos-mcp,
  author       = {Jeomon George},
  title        = {macOS-MCP: Lightweight MCP Server for macOS Automation},
  year         = {2025},
  publisher    = {GitHub},
  url          = {https://github.com/Jeomon/macos-mcp}
}

Questions or Issues? Open an issue or check SECURITY.md for security concerns.