PubNub MCP Server

The PubNub Model Context Protocol (MCP) Server is an open-source tool that enables AI-powered development environments to interact with PubNub's SDKs and global infrastructure. It allows you to build, use, and troubleshoot real-time applications faster by describing your app's behavior in natural language.

With the PubNub MCP Server, you can:

• Build real-time applications without extensive PubNub SDK knowledge
• Use AI-powered environments (like Cursor IDE, Claude Code, or Claude Desktop) to understand and implement PubNub APIs
• Access PubNub's resources dynamically, including SDK documentation and code examples
• Leverage AI agents as coding assistants to build, test, and troubleshoot your applications

For example, you can ask your AI coding assistant to build a real-time chat with presence or publish a message to a PubNub channel using plain English descriptions.

Prerequisites

Before you begin, ensure you have:

• A PubNub account
• One of the supported AI agents installed
• Basic familiarity with your chosen AI development environment

Supported AI agents

The PubNub MCP Server is compatible with:

• Cursor IDE
• Claude Code
• Claude Desktop

Setup

To set up the PubNub MCP Server, follow these steps:

Cursor IDE

To set up the PubNub MCP Server with Cursor IDE, follow these steps:

1. Create a PubNub account on the Admin Portal, and create a new app and keyset.
   
   

   Sign up

   Don't feel like leaving this page to sign up?

2. In your Cursor project, create or open the .cursor/mcp.json or ~/.cursor/mcp.json files and add your publish and subscribe keys:

   {
     "mcpServers": {
       "pubnub": {
         "command": "npx",
         "args": ["-y", "@pubnub/mcp"],
         "env": {
           "PUBNUB_SUBSCRIBE_KEY": "YOUR_SUBSCRIBE_KEY",
           "PUBNUB_PUBLISH_KEY": "YOUR_PUBLISH_KEY"
         }
       }
     }
   }

   When you save the file, a notification is displayed.

3. In the prompt, click Enable. Then, navigate to Cursor Settings (the gear icon in top right corner) -> MCP, and check if pubnub is enabled.

4. Ask the AI agent to build your PubNub-powered app for you by describing the functionality yourself or by using a sample prompt.

Agent mode

Make sure to use the Agent mode. Depending on your Cursor rules, you may also need to explicitly ask the AI agent to use the PubNub MCP server.

Claude Code

To set up the PubNub MCP Server with Claude Code, follow these steps:

1. Create a PubNub account on the Admin Portal, and create a new app and keyset.
   
   

   Sign up

   Don't feel like leaving this page to sign up?

2. In the directory of your choice, open the terminal, and run the following command where your_publish_key and your_subscribe_key are your publish and subscribe keys:

   claude mcp add pubnub \
   -e PUBNUB_PUBLISH_KEY=your_publish_key \
   -e PUBNUB_SUBSCRIBE_KEY=your_subscribe_key \
   -- npx -y @pubnub/mcp

   After you run the command, the Added stdio MCP server pubnub with command: npx -y @pubnub/mcp to local config is displayed.

3. In the terminal, run claude mcp list to check that the PubNub MCP server is added.

4. Still in the terminal, run claude and Ask the AI agent to build your PubNub-powered app for you by describing the functionality yourself or by using a sample prompt.

Claude Desktop with Docker

To set up the PubNub MCP Server with Claude Desktop, follow these steps:

1. Create a PubNub account on the Admin Portal, and create a new app and keyset.
   
   

   Sign up

   Don't feel like leaving this page to sign up?

2. In the terminal, export your keys as environment variables where your_publish_key and your_subscribe_key are your publish and subscribe keys:

   # On Linux or MacOS
   export PUBNUB_PUBLISH_KEY=your_publish_key
   export PUBNUB_SUBSCRIBE_KEY=your_subscribe_key
   
   # On Windows
   set PUBNUB_PUBLISH_KEY=your_publish_key
   set PUBNUB_SUBSCRIBE_KEY=your_subscribe_key
   
   # For Bash, permanently
   echo "export PUBNUB_PUBLISH_KEY=your_publish_key" >> ~/.bashrc
   echo "export PUBNUB_SUBSCRIBE_KEY=your_subscribe_key" >> ~/.bashrc
   
   # For Zsh, permanently
   echo 'export PUBNUB_PUBLISH_KEY=your_publish_key' >> ~/.zshrc
   echo 'export PUBNUB_SUBSCRIBE_KEY=your_subscribe_key' >> ~/.zshrc

   show all 16 lines

3. In Claude Desktop, navigate to Tools -> Add Tool.

4. Set the tool name to pubnub and the command to docker.

5. Set the tool arguments to the following:

   [
     "run",
     "-i",
     "-e", "PUBNUB_PUBLISH_KEY",
     "-e", "PUBNUB_SUBSCRIBE_KEY",
     "pubnub/pubnub-mcp-server"
   ]
   
   # For Apple Silicon or other platforms
   [
     "run",
     "--platform", "linux/arm64",
     "-i",
     "-e", "PUBNUB_PUBLISH_KEY",
     "-e", "PUBNUB_SUBSCRIBE_KEY",

   show all 17 lines

   Save the tool configuration and confirm the tool is listed under your available Claude Desktop tools.

6. In Claude Desktop's chat, Ask the AI agent to build your PubNub-powered app for you by describing the functionality yourself or by using a sample prompt.

Sample prompts

Happy vibe coding!

• "Write a PubNub app that lets the user watch streaming videos with built-in multi-user chat with PubNub."
• "Write a PubNub app for on-demand delivery of groceries with a map."
• "Write a PubNub app that tracks the location of a package in real-time."
• "Write a PubNub app that shows the weather forecast in real-time."
• "Write a PubNub app that lets users play multiplayer games with friends."
• "Write a PubNub app that shows live stock prices and news updates."
• "Write a PubNub app that lets users create and share playlists with friends."
• "Build a PubNub JavaScript app that subscribes to the my_channel channel and logs messages to the console."
• "Publish a message to the my_channel channel with the message Hello, PubNub!."
• "Show me the PubNub JavaScript SDK documentation for subscribe()."
• "List all available PubNub Functions."
• "Fetch the Python SDK docs for the publish() method."
• "Fetch the message history for the test channel."
• "Retrieve presence information (occupancy and UUIDs) for the test channel and the default channel group."