Install in Claude Desktop

Claude Desktop has first-class MCP support. This guide gets PlanMySaaS tools available in your Claude menu in under a minute.

Prerequisites

  • Claude Desktop installed (macOS 12+ or Windows 10+). Download from claude.ai/download.
  • Node.js 18+ installed (required for npx). Check with node -v.
  • A PlanMySaaS API key from Settings → API Keys.

Step 1 — Open the Claude Desktop config file

macOS

# Open in your editor (replace `code` with `nano` or `vim`)
code ~/Library/Application\ Support/Claude/claude_desktop_config.json

Windows

notepad %APPDATA%\Claude\claude_desktop_config.json
If the file doesn't exist yet, Claude Desktop's Settings → Developer → Edit Config will create an empty one for you. Click that first.

Step 2 — Add the PlanMySaaS block

Paste this inside the JSON (merge with any existing mcpServers you already have):

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "planmysaas": {
      "command": "npx",
      "args": ["-y", "@planmysaas/mcp-server"],
      "env": {
        "PLANMYSAAS_API_KEY": "pms_live_paste_your_key_here"
      }
    }
  }
}

Replace pms_live_paste_your_key_here with the real key from Settings.

Step 3 — Restart Claude Desktop

Fully quit (⌘Q on macOS / File → Exit on Windows) and reopen. The first launch downloads the @planmysaas/mcp-server package via npx, so give it ~10 seconds on the first start. Subsequent restarts are instant.

Step 4 — Verify

In any chat, type:

Check my PlanMySaaS credits.

Claude will call check_credits and show your balance. If tools don't appear, check the Claude logs:

# macOS
tail -n 50 ~/Library/Logs/Claude/mcp-server-planmysaas.log

# Windows
type %APPDATA%\Claude\logs\mcp-server-planmysaas.log

Using the tools

Once installed, Claude has 7 tools:

  • generate_research — market research for an idea (25 credits)
  • generate_architecture — system architecture (20 credits)
  • generate_features — feature specs (25 credits)
  • generate_phases — shipping roadmap (15 credits)
  • generate_prompt_pack — Cursor-ready prompts (30 credits, Starter+)
  • generate_blueprint — full one-shot pipeline (150 credits, Starter+)
  • check_credits — current balance (free)

Example prompts that trigger tools:

  • “Use PlanMySaaS to plan me a quiet-hours SMS scheduler for solo founders.”
  • “Generate architecture via PlanMySaaS for a multi-tenant photo-sharing SaaS.”
  • “Run the PlanMySaaS blueprint tool on this idea: …”

Troubleshooting

“MCP server not responding”

  • Confirm Node 18+ (node -v).
  • Run npx -y @planmysaas/mcp-server in your terminal — it should print a handshake banner and wait on stdin.
  • Make sure the config JSON is valid — an extra comma kills every MCP server, not just ours.

“401 invalid_api_key”

  • The key might be revoked — check Settings.
  • No spaces or quotes around the key in the env block.
  • Key is for the correct workspace (keys are workspace-scoped).

“402 insufficient_credits”

  • Workspace balance is short. Upgrade at /pricing.
  • Use check_credits inside Claude to see the current balance without spending anything.

Rotation

To rotate the key:

  1. Generate a new key in Settings.
  2. Edit the config JSON, replace the env value, restart Claude Desktop.
  3. Revoke the old key in Settings.

See also Cursor install, full endpoints reference, or the raw API overview.