microsoft/mcp-gateway

MCP Gateway is a reverse proxy and management layer for Model Context Protocol (MCP) servers, enabling scalable, stateless request routing, authorization and lifecycle management of MCP servers in Kubernetes environments.
> Breaking change: this version requires MCP 2026-07-28 clients and adapters. It does not provide legacy initialization, transport sessions, or protocol downgrade. See the migration guide for client requirements, request examples, deployment settings, and rollback considerations.
## Table of Contents
Overview
Key Concepts
Architecture
Features
Getting Started – Local Deployment
Getting Started – 1-Click Deploy to Azure
## Overview
This project provides:
A data gateway for independently routing each MCP request to a ready server instance.
A control plane for managing the MCP server lifecycle (deploy, update, delete).
Enterprise-ready integration points including telemetry, access control and observability.
## Key Concepts
MCP Server: A server implementing the Model Context Protocol, which typically a streamable HTTP endpoint.
Adapters: Logical resources representing MCP servers in the gateway, managed under the /adapters scope. Designed to coexist with other resource types (e.g., /agents) in a unified AI development platform.
Tools: Registered resources with MCP tool definitions that can be dynamically routed via the tool gateway router. Each tool includes metadata about its execution endpoint and input schema.
Tool Gateway Router: An MCP server that directs tool execution requests to registered tool servers based on tool definitions. Multiple router instances can handle requests without transport-session affinity.
Stateless MCP Routing: Each request carries its protocol metadata and is independently authorized. Legacy session headers and the gateway's sessionid query alias do not determine routing.
Agents & Sessions (Preview): Optional, opt-in resources for running LLM-driven agents on top of registered MCP tools. Agents are metadata (system prompt + model + allowed tool list); Sessions are individual runs that stream events over Server-Sent Events. Disabled unless FoundrySettings:Endpoint is configured.
## Architecture
mermaid
flowchart LR
subgraph Clients[" "]
direction TB
DataClient["🔌 Agent/MCP Data Client"]
MgmtClient["⚙️ Management Client"]
end
subgraph Gateway["MCP Gateway"]
direction TB
subgraph Auth1["Authentication & Authorization"]
Auth["🔐 Data Plane Auth Bearer Token / RBAC"]
Auth2["🔐 Control Plane Auth Bearer Token / RBAC"]
end
subgraph DataPlane["Data Plane"]
Routing["🔀 Adapter Routing /adapters/{name}/mcp"]
ToolRouting["🔀 Tool Router Gateway /mcp"]
end
subgraph ControlPlane["Control Plane"]
direction LR
AdapterMgmt["📦 Adapter Management /adapters CRUD"]
ToolMgmt["🔧 Tool Management /tools CRUD"]
end
subgraph Management["Backend Services"]
DeploymentMgmt["☸️ Deployment Manager"]
MetadataMgmt["📋 Metadata Manager"]
end
end
subgraph Cluster["Kubernetes Cluster"]
direction TB
subgraph ServerRow[" "]
direction LR
subgraph MCPServers["MCP Servers"]
direction TB
PodA["mcp-a-0"]
PodA1["mcp-a-1"]
PodB["mcp-b-0"]
end
subgraph ToolRouters["Tool Gateway Routers"]
direction TB
Router1["toolgateway-0"]
Router2["toolgateway-1"]