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MCP Shelf

MCP Builder skill for Claude

Reviewed by Sophie Filer · Updated 27 Oct 2026

Turns Claude into a careful MCP server author, from API research to a tested release.

If you want an MCP server for a service nobody has covered yet, this is the skill to switch on first. It gives Claude a working method instead of a blank page: study the API, decide which tools are worth exposing, write the server, then prove it works.

It favours the TypeScript SDK but handles Python with FastMCP just as well, and it nudges you toward Streamable HTTP for anything hosted and stdio for anything that runs on your own machine.

When Claude reaches for it

  • Asking Claude to wrap an API or internal service as an MCP server
  • Reviewing an existing server for tool names, descriptions and error messages
  • Writing test questions to check an assistant can actually use the server

What is in the pod

  • A four-stage method: research and plan, build, review and test, then evaluate
  • Reference notes on protocol best practice and on each SDK
  • A guide to writing evaluations: ten realistic, read-only questions with answers you can check
  • Helper scripts for running those evaluations against your server

Planting it

Claude Code

  1. Add the Anthropic skills marketplace once.
  2. Install the example-skills plugin, which includes mcp-builder.
  3. Start a new session. Claude loads the skill on its own when a task matches.
Claude Code
/plugin marketplace add anthropics/skills
/plugin install example-skills@anthropic-agent-skills

Claude apps (web, desktop, mobile)

  1. On a paid plan, open Settings and find the Skills section.
  2. Switch on mcp-builder from Anthropic's examples, or upload the folder as a zip.

By hand (Claude Code)

  1. Download the skill folder from GitHub.
  2. Put it in ~/.claude/skills/ for every project, or .claude/skills/ inside one project.
By hand (Claude Code)
~/.claude/skills/mcp-builder/SKILL.md

What it needs

  • Node.js 18+ for TypeScript servers, or Python 3.10+ for FastMCP
  • Access to the docs or API you want to wrap

Notes from the pea patch

  • Let it finish the planning stage before any code appears. The list of tools it settles on is the part worth arguing with.
  • Keep MCP Inspector open next to it: the skill tells Claude to test there, and you will want to see the raw calls yourself.
  • The evaluation questions are the most underrated part. A server that passes them is one an assistant can really use.

Pea-fect partners on the shelf

MCP InspectorThe skill relies on it to start your server and call each tool by hand.Context7Feeds Claude current SDK docs while it writes the code.GitHubHandy once the server works and it is time to open the repo and the first release.