Integrations · MCP

Connect Contexara via MCP

Give Claude a memory of you: your preferences, past decisions, and context from everywhere else you've used it. Setup takes about a minute.

Claude Code VS Code Claude Desktop Cowork claude.ai Codex Cursor

1. Get an API key

Head to the Keys page and generate one. It looks like ctx_live_..., copy it now, you won't be able to view it again later.

2. Connect

Run this in your terminal, with your own key:

claude mcp add --transport http contexara https://mcp.contexara.com/mcp \
  --header "x-api-key: ctx_live_..." \
  --scope user

Confirm it with claude mcp list, Contexara should show as Connected.

3. Try it

Tell Claude something worth keeping and ask it to save that to Contexara. Then start a new conversation and ask about it. That round trip is the whole product: what you said in one place, available everywhere else.

If Claude saves to its own memory instead, say “save this to Contexara” explicitly. The skill file below fixes this for good.

How it works

Contexara exposes two tools. cognitive_intelligence reads: Claude sends a query, Contexara searches your stored memories and returns structured, ranked results to reason over, never a raw text dump. remember writes: anything worth keeping goes through the same extraction pipeline as automatically captured conversations, so it lands with the same structure and quality.

Ask Claude to remember something and it saves to Contexara, not to the app's own memory. It becomes available in every other tool you connect.

The skill file

A short file that teaches Claude what Contexara is and when to reach for it, so it reads before answering and saves without being asked. Optional, but recommended.

Claude in the browser

Download contexara-skill.md, then in Claude go to Settings → Skills and choose Add → Upload a skill.

Claude Code

Nothing to do, contexara init installs it at ~/.claude/skills/contexara/ alongside the capture hooks.

Other hosts

Contexara speaks standard MCP over streamable HTTP, with either an x-api-key header or OAuth. Any MCP host that supports remote servers can connect the same way.

Codex and Cursor connect the same way, an x-api-key header pointed at https://mcp.contexara.com/mcp. ChatGPT support is on the way. Anything else, we haven't verified yet, so we're not calling it supported until we have.

Troubleshooting

Contexara isn't showing up

Start a genuinely new conversation, existing ones don't pick up a newly-added connector. On Claude Code, confirm with claude mcp list.

“Invalid or inactive API key”

Check the key was copied in full and hasn't been revoked from the Keys page.

No results come back

There's probably nothing stored yet. Retrieval only searches what's already been saved, so save something first, then ask about it in a new conversation.

It saved to the wrong place

If Claude says it saved a memory but nothing appears in Contexara, it likely used the app's own memory instead. Say “save this to Contexara” explicitly, and add the skill file so it stops happening.