Get Started

Introduction

This guide covers the entire lifecycle of an MCP server at the MCP Registry:

Discover: Finding trusted MCP servers.
Govern: Approving MCP servers and tools for specific project use.
Connect: Connecting the MCP servers to your local Coding Agents (Cursor, Claude Code..).

1. Discover and Allow MCP Servers

Required role & permissions: Project Admin, Allow in Project.

The JFrog MCP Registry enforces a Zero Trust model. All MCP servers are blocked by default. Before developers in your organization can use an MCP, an admin must explicitly allow it for one or more specific projects. As part of the allow process, you define tool policies that control exactly which tools the server can expose.

Open the MCP Registry: In the JFrog Platform, go to AI/ML > Discovery > MCP Servers.
Select an MCP Server: Search for an MCP server such as lighthouse-mcp.

Add to Registry in the MCP details pane.

Assign to Project: In the Add to Registry pane, select the Project to which you want to allow this MCP.
Define Tool Policy: Choose to Allow all tools from that server or configure Manual Policies (for example, Regex-based tool filtering). For more details see Configure Tool Policies.

Configure: Configure environment variables and runtime arguments. In the lighthouse-mcp, no environment variables are required and you can skip it .

Save Configuration: The MCP server is now authorized and available in the Registry for your project context. Once saved, click View in Registry.

2. Install the JFrog MCP Gateway

Target: Developer Workstation

The JFrog MCP Gateway resolves MCP binaries from Artifactory so that only approved, scanned artifacts reach your machine. One command installs the JFrog CLI, the MCP Gateway plugin, and configures your Coding Agent.

Prerequisites

Ensure you have the runtime for your desired MCP servers installed (node.js / npx or Python / uv). The script will verify this for you.

Installation

View the allowed MCP server in the Registry.

In the MCP Registry page, click Install MCP to generate your installation script (with your project and IDE).
Generate a token, select IDE, copy the installation command and run it in your terminal:

For more details about Coding Agents, see Configure Coding Agents. For details about the gateway, see MCP Gateway CLI.
When the script finishes, it prints a Magic Link.
Click the link in your terminal, then click Install in the browser to complete IDE configuration.

Confirm the MCP Gateway installation in your Coding Agent.

3. Verify & Use

Verify Connection: Open your AI agent (for example, Cursor) and ask: "Which MCPs are available?".

Add MCP: Ask the agent to add an MCP, for example, lighthouse-mcp that we just added.
Use MCP: Use your allowed MCP servers in the agent chat, such as: get the performance of jfrog.com.

Explore how your can interact with the JFrog MCP Gateway in this guide Manage MCPs via Agents.