Global mcp.json ignored — project-level works fine

Support Bug Reports
1

Where does the bug appear (feature/product)?

Cursor IDE

Describe the Bug

Adding a data point that might help narrow this down:

My global ~/.cursor/mcp.json is completely ignored by the agent. The same MCP configurations work perfectly when placed in the project-level .cursor/mcp.json.

Setup:
macOS 26.2 (Darwin 25.2.0, arm64)
Cursor Version: 2.5.22

Steps to Reproduce

Reproduction:
Add MCP servers to ~/.cursor/mcp.json
Agent cannot discover or use them
Move the exact same config to .cursor/mcp.json in the project root
Agent discovers and uses them immediately — no other changes
MCPs installed as Cursor plugins (Supabase, Figma) also work fine. The issue seems specific to the global config file being ignored entirely.
Workaround: Project-level .cursor/mcp.json for now.

Expected Behavior

MCPs in global show up in Tools (which they do) but are actually discovered by the agent when asked.

Operating System

MacOS

Version Information

Version: 2.5.22
VSCode Version: 1.105.1
Commit: 0eda506a36f70f8dc866c1ea642fcaf620090080
Date: 2026-02-23T00:15:21.265Z
Build Type: Stable
Release Track: Default
Electron: 39.4.0
Chromium: 142.0.7444.265
Node.js: 22.22.0
V8: 14.2.231.22-electron.0
OS: Darwin arm64 25.2.0

For AI issues: which model did you use?

Many

Does this stop you from using Cursor

No - Cursor works, but with this issue

3

Hey, thanks for the report. This matches a known issue where MCP servers set up globally show up in Settings > Tools & MCP, but they don’t actually get injected into the agent’s tool payload.

A few things to try:

  1. Check if you have any Cursor Plugins installed (Settings > Plugins). Even if they seem unrelated, the plugin system can interfere with discovering user-configured MCP tools. If you have any, try removing them.
  2. In Settings > Tools & MCP, toggle all your MCP servers off, wait a few seconds, then toggle them back on.
  3. Start a new chat after re-enabling them. Don’t continue an existing conversation.

If that doesn’t help, can you share:

  • What status do the global MCP servers show in Settings > Tools & MCP (green/yellow/red)?
  • A Request ID from a chat where the agent failed to discover the global MCP tools (top-right menu in the chat > Copy Request ID).

The team is aware of this type of issue. Your report with the clear global vs project reproduction helps us prioritize it.

Related thread with the same behavior: Agents skip or ignore user-installed MCP servers since plugins were introduced

Let me know how it goes.