Jargon:Model Context Protocol (MCP)
1 min read
Say this at the party
“A shared plug that lets any AI app connect to your tools and data, so each connection only has to be built once.”
In plain English
On its own, an AI can only see what you paste in. To check your calendar or read a file in Google Drive, someone has to build a connection.
Before MCP, every AI app needed its own connection to every tool. MCP is one agreed way of doing it, like USB-C for AI. A company builds one MCP server for its product, and any AI app that speaks MCP can use it.
When an app talks about "connectors", there's usually MCP underneath.
Where it came from
Anthropic released MCP as an open standard in November 2024. ChatGPT, Gemini, Microsoft Copilot and others took it up during 2025. In December 2025 Anthropic handed it to the new Agentic AI Foundation, run under the Linux Foundation, so no single company owns it.
See it in action
You connect Claude to Notion and Gmail. Ask it to "turn yesterday's meeting notes into a follow-up email" and it reads the page through one MCP server and drafts the email through another.
What people get wrong
- MCP isn't an AI model or an app. It's the agreement about how they talk to each other.
- Connecting an MCP server means trusting it. A badly made or dodgy one can see what it's given, or slip the AI hidden instructions.
Go deeper
- ArticleAnthropic, 2024Introducing the Model Context ProtocolThe launch post: the problem it solves, in a few paragraphs.
- Guidemodelcontextprotocol.ioWhat is the Model Context Protocol (MCP)?The official intro, with the USB-C comparison and diagrams.
- ArticleAnthropic, 2025Donating MCP to the Agentic AI FoundationWhy MCP now belongs to no single company.
- GuideGitHub, modelcontextprotocolModel Context Protocol ServersA list of ready-made servers, to see what can plug in.
Related jargon
Drafted with AI, checked by the AI Council (Claude, ChatGPT and Gemini) and signed off by Phin.