Just curious if a Rhino MCP server exists that’s officially supported by McNeel or if one is in the works? It seems like it would be incredibily useful for Claude Code or other models to “see” what’s actually being created in the Grasshopper canvas and Rhino document/viewport. So more of a reader vs a writer (until the models get good at spatial understanding). This way Claude Code or others could be used to debug Grasshopper errors and even help you write and edit code for little script components. Even for less advanced users of Rhino I can see them pretty soon uploading their sketches or whatever to like simple AI chatbot that has connectors (via MCP) and then just be like what commands in Rhino do I need to take to get to this result. So it’s actually something I think would help non technical users of Rhino become more technical.
As far as MCP goes, it’s pretty easy to stand up the server, internally I’ve done a hacky one, and I’ve seen some community made ones on GH for Rhino or GH, but the real challenge is having it tightly coupled everything Rhino/Grasshopper can do. That’s more of the challenge and why it makes perhaps more sense for McNeel to make it a first class citizen of Rhino/Grasshopper. It seems highly likely that some of the models soon might have a good understanding of spatial relationships, which we haven’t seen yet, but as soon as that happens, it wouldn’t be hard to have that MCP invoke Rhino commands and actually create useful results.
In my testing Claude just loooooves writing Python so I made sure it can do that and/or use commands if it so wishes (which is rare). It can of course also capture the viewport with a lower res image (to save on tokens) to iterate and rotate the camera to see different angles.
One thing I think needs some work is teaching it how to perform low token operations first before doing more expensive ones.
@CallumSykes I’m currently testing a different rhino MCP (https://www.food4rhino.com/en/app/rhinomcp) for model takeoffs - it’s so far been pretty good at breaking down BIM-generated geometry with descriptive names and block/sub-block construction. About to do a side-by-side comparison with your version to see how it fares. last attempt chewed through half my daily token quota on Claude Pro in one conversation.
Hello @CallumSykes
Is there any plan in near future to update the RhinoMCP to include Grasshopper?
To handle Grasshopper as well with an AI agent directly.
In the meantime, I use Cordyceps.
I know there are other Plug-In around, but to use this not only privat as well commercial in my company we need to have a official approach from McNeel.
Thank you for the MCP connection! That makes communication about geometry data much easier and comfortable. I’m working 98% with ScriptEditor and ~2% GH. With the available tools I already can do more than I was dreaming about. I’ll have to get beyond my limits…
The format for installing a connector/extenstion from Claude Desktop has changed. The instructions at Claude Desktop – Rhino MCP Platform no longer cleanly apply.
Rhino MCP Platform — Installation Report for McNeel
Environment
Claude Desktop (new version with Chat / CoWork / Code tabs)
Rhino 9 WIP, Windows 10
What the current documentation says to do
Install Claude Desktop
Install connector.mcpb via Settings → Extensions → Advanced settings
Install the Rhino plugin via Yak
What has changed in Claude Desktop
The Extensions/Advanced settings panel no longer exists. It has been replaced by a Connectors panel that only supports remote HTTP/HTTPS MCP servers via URL. There is no mechanism to install a .mcpb file or register a local stdio executable.
What we tried
Browsing the connector marketplace — Rhino does not appear.
“Add custom connector” dialog — Accepts only a remote MCP server URL. Entering http://localhost:10500 or http://localhost:10500/sse fails validation (red field, Add button greyed out). Localhost URLs appear to be rejected.
Manually editing claude_desktop_config.json with the stdio entry:
Claude Desktop overwrites this file on every restart, removing the Rhino entry. The new Connectors system manages the config exclusively and does not preserve stdio server entries.
What McNeel needs to do
The rhino-mcp-router.exe needs to be updated to run as an HTTP/SSE MCP server (not stdio), listenable at a localhost port, so it can be registered via the “Add custom connector” URL field. Ideally McNeel also submits it to the Anthropic connector marketplace so it appears under “Browse connectors.”
The .mcpb connector format is no longer supported in the current Claude Desktop release.
I saw the McNeel Rhino MCP Platform in the PackageManager and installed it, but the instructions for adding it to Claude Desktop are incorrect. It also looks like they only provided an executable for Apple Silicon. There is no version for Intel Macs.
What doesn’t work for you? I’m still tweaking and trying to get this stuff to be perfect, but the steps should work correctly.
This is correct. I do not have one to test on and the combination of AI agents and win-arm64/win-x64/Silicon is already quite a lot of combinations for me to try and tackle.
This being said you could probably bypass my new router and just connect to Rhino via the http port MCPStart spits out by pasting it into Claude and asking it to add it to your mcp list, although I confess I have not tried.
