How to install Claude Desktop MCP.

The Model Context Protocol (MCP) allows Large Language Models to interact securely with external tools. While developers often use MCP inside custom python or node applications, you can also plug MCP servers directly into the official Claude Desktop app. This gives your local Claude client the ability to browse OpenAPI specs, fetch /price-data in under 100ms, and interact with the web through wmcp.sh.

Step-by-step configuration.

1. Open Claude Desktop. Ensure you have the latest version of the Claude Desktop application installed on your Mac or Windows machine.
2. Navigate to Settings. Click on your profile or use the application menu to open the Settings pane.
3. Open Developer Settings. Go to the Developer tab. Here you will find an option to edit your MCP configuration.
4. Edit the Config File. Click the button to open claude_desktop_config.json in your default text editor. If the file doesn't exist yet, it will be created in your app data directory (e.g., ~/Library/Application Support/Claude/claude_desktop_config.json on macOS).
5. Add the wmcp.sh Remote Server. We will use the standard npx command to run a lightweight local bridge that connects Claude Desktop to the remote wmcp.sh server over Server-Sent Events (SSE) or stdio. Anthropic provides an @modelcontextprotocol/inspector, but to connect a remote URL as an MCP server, you typically use a small node script or the provided npx runner.
6. Save and Restart. Save the claude_desktop_config.json file and restart Claude Desktop. The application will read the configuration and initialize the new MCP tools.

The exact JSON config.

wmcp.sh exposes a real MCP server (JSON-RPC over Streamable HTTP) per URL at https://www.wmcp.sh/mcp/u/<base64url-of-your-url>. Clients with native remote-MCP support (Claude Code, Cursor, Codex, VS Code) connect directly:

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "allbirds": {
      "type": "http",
      "url": "https://www.wmcp.sh/mcp/u/aHR0cHM6Ly93d3cuYWxsYmlyZHMuY29tL3Byb2R1Y3RzL21lbnMtd29vbC1ydW5uZXJz"
    }
  }
}

That base64url string decodes to https://www.allbirds.com/products/mens-wool-runners. Encode your own with node -e "process.stdout.write(Buffer.from('https://your-url').toString('base64url'))".

Claude Desktop builds that only support local (stdio) servers can bridge to the same endpoint with mcp-remote:

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "allbirds": {
      "command": "npx",
      "args": [
        "mcp-remote",
        "https://www.wmcp.sh/mcp/u/aHR0cHM6Ly93d3cuYWxsYmlyZHMuY29tL3Byb2R1Y3RzL21lbnMtd29vbC1ydW5uZXJz"
      ]
    }
  }
}

Compose several sites into one server with https://www.wmcp.sh/mcp/url?url=site-a&url=site-b, or save a reusable bundle (Pro) and connect to https://www.wmcp.sh/mcp/set/<id>. tools/list is free; live tools/call needs a paid key passed as an Authorization: Bearer header. After restarting, you'll see the tools indicator; then ask Claude e.g. "List the variants and price for this product."

Troubleshooting.

• Syntax Errors: Ensure your JSON is perfectly valid. Missing commas or unmatched braces will cause Claude Desktop to silently fail to load the tools.
• Node.js Missing: The configuration above relies on npx, which means you must have Node.js installed on your machine and available in your system's PATH.
• Network Latency: wmcp.sh is globally distributed on Cloudflare Workers, providing sub-100ms latency to the edge. However, the final connection speed depends on your local internet connection. Responses are returned from a short-TTL cache (~1s) where applicable.

Keep reading.

/how-to/expose-shopify-mcp · /agent-ready · /managed · /blog · /directory