SKILL.md and only the
supporting references, scripts, templates, or assets needed for the task.
Zero-configuration setup
Create a conventionalskills/ directory next to your server project. Its
presence enables Skills over MCP automatically; no server option is required.
SKILL.md whose name matches its directory:
SKILL.md are published as
independent skills as well as supporting content of their parent skill.
Configure discovery
mcp-use dev --mcp-dir src/mcp, the conventional directory becomes
src/mcp/skills. An explicit skills.directory remains relative to the
project root. Missing directories are silent only for automatic discovery;
true, {}, and custom configuration fail with an actionable error.
What hosts discover
When skills are enabled the server declaresio.modelcontextprotocol/skills with directory reads. Hosts use:
skills/listfor the deterministic skill catalog and complete digest sets.skills/getto refresh or retrieve one skill by itsSKILL.mdURI.resources/readfor individual text or binary files.resources/directory/readto inspect one directory level at a time.
mcp-use dev revalidates skills while the server runs. If one skill becomes
invalid, the development server reloads with that skill omitted from the
current catalog; every other valid skill remains available. The CLI logs the
invalid skill and its validation error, and adds it back on the next successful
reload. If every skill is invalid, the server advertises an empty catalog rather
than serving stale skill content.
mcp-use build remains strict: an invalid skill catalog fails the build.
Successful builds embed the validated snapshot, so the production server does
not need the source skill directory. Discovery and YAML validation are Node-only
CLI concerns; the server and Edge runtime receive only the immutable embedded
snapshot.