Claude connectors vs Claude Code MCP servers

The distinction, in one table

Both are remote MCP servers speaking the same protocol to the same endpoints. Everything that differs is administrative, and all of it matters.

Anthropic also uses "connector" as an umbrella for a few adjacent things worth naming so the docs stop being confusing: prebuilt integrations Anthropic runs itself (Google Drive, Gmail, Calendar, GitHub, Slack, Microsoft 365), third-party remote servers listed in the directory at claude.ai/directory, and MCP Bundles, which package a local server for Claude Desktop. Only the first two reach Claude Code.

Why servers you never added are in your terminal

If you signed into Claude Code with a Claude subscription, every connector on your account is offered to the CLI automatically. Run /mcp and they appear in their own section, tagged as coming from claude.ai. Nobody configured this on your machine, which is why it reads as a bug the first time.

/mcp

Connectors you have never signed into collapse behind a Show unused connectors row, so an organisation with forty provisioned connectors does not fill the panel. One you have used before stays visible even when it needs re-authentication.

When they do not appear

Connector sync is tied to the active authentication method, and Claude Code has several. If any of these is active, connectors are not fetched at all, even if you ran /login at some point in the past.

/status                 # which auth is active right now
echo $ANTHROPIC_API_KEY # non-empty means connectors are off
/login                  # sign in with the claude.ai account
/mcp                    # connectors should now be listed

Precedence, and the duplicate problem

When the same server is defined more than once, Claude Code connects once and uses the highest-precedence definition. The whole entry wins; fields are never merged across sources.

1. Local scope, in ~/.claude.json under this project's path
2. Project scope, in the repository's .mcp.json
3. User scope, in ~/.claude.json
4. Plugin-provided servers
5. claude.ai connectors

When that happens, /mcp lists the connector as hidden and tells you how to remove the duplicate if you would rather use the connector version. Usually you would not: your own entry is the one you can pin, scope, and commit.

Turning them off

Three levels, from one connector to all of them.

{
  "disableClaudeAiConnectors": true
}

ENABLE_CLAUDEAI_MCP_SERVERS=false claude

Organisation controls on individual tools

On Team and Enterprise, admins can set per-tool controls on connectors, and Claude Code reads and enforces them locally at startup. A tool set to ask prompts on every call with the reason "Your organization requires approval for this tool", even in acceptEdits, auto, and bypassPermissions modes, with no remember-my-choice option; in dontAsk mode the call is denied instead. A tool set to blocked is filtered out before Claude ever sees it.

Naming, permissions, and where connectors differ

Connector tools are addressable in permission rules and hook matchers like any other MCP tool, but under a different prefix, and this is the detail that makes a carefully written rule silently match nothing.

{
  "permissions": {
    "allow": ["mcp__github__get_*"],
    "ask": ["mcp__claude_ai_slack"],
    "deny": ["mcp__*"]
  }
}

Which surface should own a server

The practical answer for most people is both, deliberately: connectors for the tools you want in the Claude app and on your phone, and a committed .mcp.json for the ones the repository needs to build. Just be aware of the endpoint-matching rule above, because that is the case where adding it twice makes one of them quietly disappear.

Getting a straight answer about what is connected

# what is configured on this machine, with a health check
claude mcp list

# one server in detail, including whether OAuth is configured
claude mcp get sentry

# inside a session: everything, including connectors and plugin servers
/mcp

A last practical note: several Anthropic-hosted connectors, including Microsoft 365, Gmail, and Google Calendar, do not support local OAuth from Claude Code, because the upstream identity provider only accepts the redirect URL claude.ai registered. Authenticating one in /mcp shows a message pointing you at Settings then Connectors on claude.ai. Connect it there once and it appears in Claude Code automatically.

Questions people ask

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