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The MCP Gateway provides a centralized control plane for managing Model Context Protocol (MCP) servers across your organization.
MCP Gateway is a feature of Portkey Cloud and enterprise deployments. It is documented fully at portkey.ai/docs/product/mcp-gateway. This section provides an overview of the capabilities.

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What is MCP?

MCP (Model Context Protocol) is an open protocol that lets AI clients connect to external tools and data sources — called MCP servers. When an AI assistant needs to query a database, read a file, or call an API, it does so through an MCP server. Without a gateway, every client authenticates separately to every MCP server. There is no central place to manage access, audit tool calls, or revoke permissions.

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Core capabilities

Authentication

Single auth layer at the gateway. Users authenticate once; your MCP servers receive verified requests — no user credentials reach the server directly.

Access control

Control which teams and users can access which MCP servers and specific tools. Revoke access instantly without touching server configuration.

Observability

Every tool call is logged with full context: who called what, the parameters passed, the response returned, and end-to-end latency.

Identity forwarding

Forward verified user identity (email, team, roles) to MCP servers automatically so servers can apply their own authorization logic.

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How it works

MCP Client (Claude Desktop, Cursor, VS Code, ...)
        │
        │  authenticated request
        ▼
  Portkey MCP Gateway
        │  ├─ authenticates the user
        │  ├─ checks access policy
        │  ├─ logs the tool call
        │  └─ forwards identity headers
        ▼
  Your MCP Server (filesystem, GitHub, postgres, ...)
The gateway is transparent to both the client and server. Clients connect to a single Portkey endpoint; servers receive requests with a verified shared secret and user identity headers.

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Compatible clients

Works with any MCP-compatible client:
  • Claude Desktop — Anthropic’s desktop application
  • Cursor — AI-powered code editor
  • VS Code — with the Continue extension or similar MCP clients
  • Custom clients — any application implementing the MCP protocol

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Get started

Quickstart

Connect your first MCP client through the Portkey MCP Gateway.

Portkey Cloud

Sign up for Portkey Cloud to access the full MCP Gateway.

Full documentation

Read the complete MCP Gateway documentation on portkey.ai.

Authentication

Learn how the gateway authenticates clients and forwards identity.

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