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UiPath CLI user guide

Last updated May 7, 2026

uip mcp

uip mcp exposes the CLI as a Model Context Protocol server, letting MCP-aware clients (Claude Desktop, Cursor, VS Code MCP hosts, etc.) invoke any uip subcommand as a tool.

Note:

Skills are the primary path for teaching AI coding agents to use the UiPath CLI — see uip skills and Skills. MCP is provided as an alternative for clients that do not support skills or that prefer MCP-style tool invocation. If your agent supports skills, prefer skills.

Synopsis​

uip mcp serve
uip mcp serve

uip mcp serve honors the global options (--output, --output-filter, --log-level, --log-file) for the server process itself; the tool it exposes to clients accepts any CLI command string and returns its combined stdout/stderr. Exit codes follow the standard contract.

uip mcp serve​

Starts the MCP server on stdio (newline-delimited JSON-RPC). There is no network listener, no HTTP transport, and no port configuration — stdio is the only supported transport in 1.x.

Arguments: none.

Options: none. The server runs until the stdio transport is closed by the client (usually when the host application quits).

Behavior:

  • The server advertises a single tool, run_command, which takes one argument:
    • command (string) — The CLI command to run, without the uip prefix. Example: "login status --output json".
  • The server enumerates every installed uip subcommand at startup and includes a rendered command catalog in the MCP tool's description. mcp and help subcommands are excluded from that catalog — the client cannot ask the server to start another MCP server.
  • On each run_command call, the CLI runs the requested command in a child invocation and returns the combined stdout/stderr. If the child exits non-zero, or if it wrote an error envelope to stderr with a zero exit code (a rare case where a command reports failure without changing the exit code), the result is flagged isError: true and prefixed with Error (exit code N):.

Example (starting the server from a shell — normally your MCP client launches this for you):

uip mcp serve
uip mcp serve

Configuring an MCP client​

All configurations use the same command/args. The server name (uipath below) is arbitrary.

Claude Desktop — edit claude_desktop_config.json:

  • macOS: ~/Library/Application Support/Claude/claude_desktop_config.json
  • Windows: %APPDATA%\Claude\claude_desktop_config.json
{
  "mcpServers": {
    "uipath": {
      "command": "uip",
      "args": ["mcp", "serve"]
    }
  }
}
{
  "mcpServers": {
    "uipath": {
      "command": "uip",
      "args": ["mcp", "serve"]
    }
  }
}

Restart Claude Desktop after saving.

Claude Code — add via its CLI:

claude mcp add uipath -- uip mcp serve
claude mcp add uipath -- uip mcp serve

Cursor — edit .cursor/mcp.json (project-local) or the Cursor global MCP config:

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "uipath": {
      "command": "uip",
      "args": ["mcp", "serve"]
    }
  }
}
{
  "mcpServers": {
    "uipath": {
      "command": "uip",
      "args": ["mcp", "serve"]
    }
  }
}

VS Code — edit .vscode/mcp.json:

{
  "servers": {
    "uipath": {
      "command": "uip",
      "args": ["mcp", "serve"]
    }
  }
}
{
  "servers": {
    "uipath": {
      "command": "uip",
      "args": ["mcp", "serve"]
    }
  }
}

Lifecycle​

The MCP server has no standalone stop command. It lives as a child process of the MCP client and exits when:

  • the client closes the stdio connection,
  • the host application quits, or
  • you remove the server entry from the client's config and reload.

Authentication and tenant context​

uip mcp serve does not manage credentials. Every run_command invocation reads the same stored session as an interactive shell would — so you must have run uip login separately before asking the agent to call commands that require auth. If no session exists, the tool result will contain the usual AuthenticationError payload (see Exit codes).

Data shape​

Tool results follow the MCP tool-call contract. On success:

{
  "content": [
    { "type": "text", "text": "<combined stdout/stderr>" }
  ],
  "isError": false
}
{
  "content": [
    { "type": "text", "text": "<combined stdout/stderr>" }
  ],
  "isError": false
}

On failure, isError is true and text is prefixed with Error (exit code N):. The inner text is the normal CLI output (JSON if the caller requested --output json, otherwise the default format).

Considerations​

  • Always request JSON from inside MCP calls. Pass --output json in the command string so the agent receives structured data instead of tables.
  • No filtering of destructive commands. The run_command tool can invoke any uip subcommand, including logout, tools uninstall, and tools that mutate Orchestrator state. Treat the MCP server as an authenticated shell and scope the agent accordingly.
  • help and mcp are hidden from the catalog but can still be invoked by the client. Nothing prevents mcp serve from being called recursively through another run_command; this is a no-op in practice because the outer server controls stdio.
  • uip skills — primary AI integration path.
  • Skills — why skills are preferred over raw MCP access for agent ergonomics.
  • Authentication — the session run_command inherits.
  • Global options — --output json inside MCP calls.

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