MCP Proxy
A bidirectional proxy that bridges stdio and SSE/Streamable HTTP MCP transports, enabling clients like Claude Desktop (which only speak stdio) to connect to remote HTTP-based MCP servers, and vice versa.
Score Breakdown
⚙ Agent Friendliness
🔒 Security
MCP protocol proxy/multiplexer. Security depends on proxied servers. Proxy sees all tool calls — treat as high-trust infrastructure. Use TLS for transport. Auth per proxied server.
⚡ Reliability
Best When
Your MCP client only supports stdio but your servers speak HTTP/SSE, or you need to expose a local stdio server to remote consumers.
Avoid When
Client and server already support the same transport natively; the proxy layer adds latency and an extra failure point.
Use Cases
- • Connect Claude Desktop to a remote SSE-based MCP server that it cannot natively reach
- • Expose a local stdio MCP server over SSE so remote clients can consume it
- • Run multiple named MCP servers through a single proxy with a JSON config file
- • Add OAuth2 or bearer token authentication in front of MCP servers that lack built-in auth
Not For
- • Scenarios where client and server already share the same transport — adds unnecessary complexity
- • Teams needing domain-level tool routing (use a dedicated MCP gateway instead)
- • Users who need the proxy to transform or inspect MCP message content
Interface
Authentication
Supports bearer token via API_ACCESS_TOKEN env var, custom headers via --headers flag, and full OAuth2 flow (client ID, secret, token URL). SSL verification can be disabled for self-signed certs.
Pricing
MIT licensed. Available via PyPI, pipx, uv, or Docker at no cost.
Agent Metadata
Known Gotchas
- ⚠ Stateless mode for Streamable HTTP may cause issues with servers that rely on session state
- ⚠ SSL verification disabled by default in some configurations — verify settings in security-sensitive environments
- ⚠ CORS must be explicitly configured via --allow-origin; open CORS is a security risk
- ⚠ OAuth2 token refresh behavior under long-running agent sessions is not clearly documented
Alternatives
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Scores are editorial opinions as of 2026-03-07.