It is early and says so — the surface is expected to change. The direction worth watching is the idalib mode, which would drop both the plugin install and the requirement to have IDA running at all.
A server for IDA interaction and automation, paired with a plugin that runs inside IDA. The server exposes the database to an MCP client; the plugin is what gives it access to the live IDA session.
Tools for reading an IDA database from a large language model, driven through the plugin running inside IDA. The author notes an idalib mode is in development that will remove both the plugin install and the need to have IDA running, since idalib is available from IDA Pro 9.0+.
Two halves. On the server side, `uvx mcp-server-ida` needs no separate install, or `pip install mcp-server-ida` and run it with `python -m mcp_server_ida`. On the IDA side, copy `repository/plugin/ida_mcp_server_plugin.py` and the `ida_mcp_server_plugin` directory into IDA's plugin directory — `%APPDATA%\Hex-Rays\IDA Pro\plugins` on Windows, `$HOME/.idapro/plugins` on Linux and macOS. Then add it to `claude_desktop_config.json` with `uvx` or `python -m` as the command. The MCP inspector can be pointed at it for debugging. The author describes it as early development, with the functionality and available tools subject to change and expansion.
One command — pip install mcp-server-ida