Welcome
memors-mcp gives your AI assistant a memory it can show its work from.
You tell Claude something once: how your team deploys, why a decision was made, which version of a library you use. Claude saves it. Next week, in a new conversation, Claude finds it again and tells you exactly where the answer came from, who wrote it down, and when.
Everything lives in one file on your own computer. Nothing is sent to a cloud service.
Who this is for
- People who work with Claude every day and are tired of explaining the same background in every new conversation.
- Teams and project leads who want decisions, conventions and hard-won answers to stay findable, with a clear record of where each one came from.
- Anyone who cares where an answer came from. Every result carries its source, and you can ask why it was chosen.
What it is not
- It is not a chat app. You keep using Claude as usual; memors-mcp works in the background.
- It is not a cloud service. There is no account, no subscription and no upload.
- It does not browse the web. Claude finds information and hands it over to be saved.
- It does not decide what is true on your behalf. Notes Claude writes are marked as Claude’s until you say otherwise.
How to read this guide
| If you want to… | Read |
|---|---|
| Decide whether it is worth it | Why it matters |
| Get it running | Quick start, about ten minutes |
| Learn what to say to Claude | Everyday use |
| Understand what you can rely on | Trust and Privacy and safety |
| See it in a browser | Looking inside |
| Get ideas | Use cases |
| Fix a problem | Questions and troubleshooting |
Running it for others, or want the technical details? The operator guide covers installation options, every setting, tuning and monitoring.
Why it matters
The problem: an assistant that forgets
AI assistants are good at reasoning and poor at remembering. Each new conversation starts from zero. So people paste the same background again and again: the project layout, the team’s conventions, the decision made last month and the reason for it. Time goes into re-explaining instead of working. When the assistant guesses instead, it can sound confident and still be wrong.
What changes with memors-mcp
Answers come with receipts. Every answer from the memory carries its source: which document, which passage, who saved it and when. You can open the original in one step. You can also ask why that passage was chosen over the others. The memory explains its own ranking in plain terms.
You stop repeating yourself. Save a document, a decision or a single fact once. Claude looks it up when it is relevant, in this conversation or one months from now.
Corrections keep their history. When a fact changes, such as “we moved from Postgres 15 to 16”, the new fact replaces the old one. The old one is kept as history. You can always ask what was believed on a given date.
You stay in charge of what counts as reliable. Anything Claude saves on its own is labelled as Claude’s work. Only you can mark something as checked. Claude can ask, but it cannot do it itself. See Trust.
It stays on your machine. The memory is one file on your computer. It works offline after a one-time download, and it sends nothing anywhere. See Privacy and safety.
It costs nothing to run. It is free and open source under the MIT licence. It needs no server, no database to install and no paid service.
Where it pays off
| Situation | Without a memory | With memors-mcp |
|---|---|---|
| Starting a new conversation on an ongoing project | Paste the background again | Claude looks it up |
| “Why did we choose this?” six months later | Search chat history or ask around | The decision is saved with its reason and date |
| Using a specific version of a library | The assistant mixes up versions | Saved docs are tagged with their version, and Claude looks in the right one |
| A new teammate joins | Weeks of tribal knowledge | The same memory is browsable from day one |
| A fact changes | Old and new answers compete | The new fact replaces the old, and the history stays visible |
More examples are in Use cases.
How it compares to Claude’s built-in memory
Claude Code and the Claude apps have their own memory features. For many people those are the right default, and they need no setup.
memors-mcp is for when you want more than that:
- to see and check what the memory holds, in a browser or as plain files;
- to know why a particular answer came back;
- to keep separate memories for separate projects or clients;
- to keep a full history of what changed and when;
- to make sure nothing leaves your computer.
The two can be used side by side.
Quick start
This takes about ten minutes. At the end, Claude will have a memory, and you will have saved your first note and asked your first question.
What you need
- A Mac, Linux or Windows computer.
- Claude Code, or the Claude Desktop app.
- About 200 MB of free disk space for the program and its one-time download.
Step 1: Download memors-mcp
-
Open the releases page.
-
Download the file for your computer:
Your computer File name contains Mac with Apple silicon (M1 and newer) darwin_arm64Mac with Intel darwin_amd64Linux linux_amd64orlinux_arm64Windows windows_amd64 -
Unpack it. Inside is a single program called
memors-mcp(ormemors-mcp.exeon Windows). -
Move it somewhere permanent, for example a
binfolder in your home folder. Note the full path; you need it in the next step.
To check that it runs, open a terminal and type the path to the program followed by version:
~/bin/memors-mcp version
You should see a version number. On a Mac, if you see a warning that the developer cannot be verified, open System Settings → Privacy & Security and choose Allow Anyway.
Step 2: Connect it to Claude
Choose a name for this memory. One memory per project works well, for example my-project.
Claude Code
Run this once in a terminal, with your own path and name:
claude mcp add memors --env MEMORS_KB=my-project -- ~/bin/memors-mcp
Claude Desktop
Open Settings → Developer → Edit Config, add the memors entry below and save. Use the full
path to the program; ~ does not work here.
{
"mcpServers": {
"memors": {
"command": "/Users/you/bin/memors-mcp",
"env": { "MEMORS_KB": "my-project" }
}
}
}
Then quit Claude Desktop completely and open it again.
Optional: one shared server for all your Claude Code sessions
With the setup above, every Claude Code session starts its own copy of memors-mcp in the background. Alternatively, you can run one memors-mcp yourself and let every session connect to it over a local web address. Pick this if you want the Live page in the browser view, which shows which sessions are connected and what they are doing right now.
-
In a terminal, start the server and leave the terminal open:
MEMORS_KB=my-project ~/bin/memors-mcp serve --http 127.0.0.1:8765 -
Connect Claude Code to it, once:
claude mcp add --transport http memors http://127.0.0.1:8765/mcpIf you already added
memorswith the command above, remove it first withclaude mcp remove memors, or give this one another name. -
Open
http://127.0.0.1:8765/in your browser to see your memory, including the Live page.
On your own computer no password is needed. If you want other computers to connect, you need a certificate and a token; see “One shared server over HTTP” in the operator guide.
Claude can use the memory only while that terminal is running. If you close it, Claude
reports that memors is not connected; start it again and run /mcp in Claude Code to
reconnect. The address works only on your own computer.
Step 3: Check that Claude sees it
Start a new conversation and ask:
What is in my memors knowledge base?
Claude should answer that the memory is empty, or list what it holds. In Claude Code, the
/mcp command also lists memors as connected.
The first start downloads a language model. It is about 140 MB, happens once, and takes a minute or two. Until it finishes, searching still works by matching words, and Claude may mention that search is “degraded”. Notes saved during that time are fully searchable once the download completes. This is the only time memors-mcp uses the internet.
Step 4: Save your first note
Tell Claude something worth keeping, and ask it to save it:
Save this to memors: we deploy on Tuesdays only, and the release owner runs the smoke tests before tagging.
Claude confirms it was saved and gives it an address that starts with memo://. That address
is how you and Claude point at this exact note later.
You can also hand over a whole document:
Read docs/architecture.md and save it to memors as project documentation.
Step 5: Ask your first question
Start a new conversation, so Claude cannot simply remember the last one, and ask:
When do we release? Check memors.
Claude finds the note, answers, and names the source. To see how it decided, ask:
Why did that result come first?
You are set up
- Learn what to say day to day in Everyday use.
- Open the memory in a browser: Looking inside.
- If something did not work, see Questions and troubleshooting.
Everyday use
You use memors-mcp by talking to Claude. There are no special commands to learn. Say what you want in your own words, and mention “memors” when you want Claude to use the memory rather than its general knowledge.
| You want to… | Say something like… | Chapter |
|---|---|---|
| Keep a document or a note | “Save this to memors.” | Saving documents and notes |
| Find something | “What does memors say about our deploy process?” | Asking questions |
| Record one fact, or correct one | “Remember that the API limit is 100 requests per minute.” | Facts and corrections |
| Remove something | “Forget the old onboarding note; it is wrong.” | Forgetting things |
| Keep topics or projects apart | “Save this on the billing shelf.” | Keeping work separate |
Tip. Claude works better with the memory once it knows the house rules. The project ships a short guide for Claude called
SKILL.md. Put it in your project, or paste it into a conversation, and Claude will search before answering and save what it learns.
Saving documents and notes
What you can save
- Documents: design notes, guides, meeting notes, documentation pages Claude has read for you, or any markdown or text file.
- Notes: a few sentences about something worth keeping.
- Code explanations: how a module works, and why it was written that way.
- Conversations: a summary of a discussion and what was decided.
How to ask
Save this to memors as a note: the staging database is reset every Sunday night.
Read the file
docs/runbook.mdand save it to memors.
Fetch the gRPC Go documentation page on deadlines and save it to memors, as version 1.64.
Claude replies with an address such as memo://doc/01a1…. You do not need to remember it.
Claude and the browser view use it to point at that exact document.
Good habits
- Say where it came from. When Claude saves a web page, it records the web address. When you dictate a note, it records that you said it. Later, every answer shows this.
- Say which version. For documentation about a tool or library, mention the version. Later questions about that version then get answers for that version, and not for an older one.
- Add one line of context to a long document, such as “This is the 2026 security policy for the payments team.” It helps the right passages surface.
Saving the same thing twice
Saving an identical document again does nothing, so there are no duplicates. Saving a changed version keeps both: the new one becomes current, and the old one stays in its history. You can always see what a document said on an earlier date.
Saving from the terminal
If you prefer, you can save files without Claude, for example a whole folder of notes:
memors-mcp ingest ~/notes/project-x
Things you save yourself this way are marked as yours. Things Claude saves are marked as Claude’s. Trust explains why that matters.
Asking questions
How to ask
Ask the way you would ask a colleague, and mention memors so Claude checks the memory first:
What does memors say about how we handle failed payments?
Check memors: which version of the gRPC library do we use, and what changed in it?
Claude searches and reads the most relevant passages. It then answers and names its sources.
Starting a chat
memors-mcp offers a ready-made starter, ask, that keeps Claude to the memory for the rest of the conversation:
- Claude Code: type
/mcp__memors__askand press Enter. Claude says in a sentence what the memory holds and asks what you want to know; then ask your questions as usual. Put the question in a message of its own: a word after the command is read as a shelf name, so/mcp__memors__ask billingkeeps the chat to the billing shelf. - Claude Desktop: click +, choose memors, then ask. Leave the shelf empty to search everything, and type your question in the message.
The middle of the command is the name memors-mcp was connected under. A memory added as
memors-client-b (see Keeping work separate) starts with
/mcp__memors-client-b__ask, and one connected from the menu-bar app as memors-work with
/mcp__memors-work__ask. In the list that appears when you type /, they show as
memors-client-b:ask (MCP) and so on.
Claude then answers only from what the memory holds. Every statement ends with a footnote
naming the saved item and its memo:// address. If the memory has nothing on a point, Claude
says so instead of guessing, and it tells you when an answer rests only on something Claude
saved itself. To narrow a question, say so in the chat, for example “only version 1.64”.
What comes back
Each result carries:
- Where it came from: the document title and, for web pages, the original address.
- Who saved it: you, Claude, or a checked source. See Trust.
- When it was saved, and whether a newer version exists.
- How strong the match is: strong, moderate or weak. A weak match is a hint, not an answer, and Claude should treat it that way.
Asking why
Every search can explain itself. Ask:
Why did that come up first?
Claude can show which kinds of matching found each result. Some results match your exact words, some match a name or code identifier exactly, and some match the meaning even when the words differ. Claude can also show how each result scored. The same explanation is visible in the browser view. See Looking inside.
When nothing is found
If the memory holds nothing relevant, memors-mcp says so plainly and does not offer the closest guess. That is deliberate. “We don’t have this” is more useful than a confident wrong answer. Claude then knows to look elsewhere. Once it finds the answer, ask it to save it, so the next person does not have to search again.
Too many results
If a question matches a lot, the answer says that some results were left out and suggests how to narrow it, for example by version or by shelf. You can say:
Only look at version 1.64.
Only search the billing shelf.
Asking about the past
Because old versions are kept, you can ask what the memory said at an earlier date:
What did memors say our database version was on 1 March?
Facts and corrections
A fact is one short statement worth keeping on its own:
- “The API rate limit is 100 requests per minute.”
- “Alice owns the billing service.”
- “We use Postgres 16 in production.”
Facts are separate from documents because they are small, they change, and you often want the current one.
Recording a fact
Remember that the API rate limit is 100 requests per minute.
A good fact points to its proof. When Claude learns a fact from a saved document, it links the fact to the passage that says so. The fact then carries its own source.
You can also say how long a fact holds:
Remember that the office is closed from 23 December to 2 January.
Correcting a fact
When something changes, say so:
The rate limit is now 200 per minute. Update memors.
Claude records the new fact as replacing the old one. The new fact is current from now on. The old one is not deleted; it is kept as history with the date it stopped being true.
Looking back
What was the rate limit in January?
Show me the history of the rate limit fact.
The browser view has a facts timeline that shows the same thing at a glance. See Looking inside.
When facts disagree
Two facts can contradict each other, for example when two people recorded different numbers. memors-mcp notices this and lists it as something to resolve. See Keeping it tidy.
Forgetting things
Sometimes a note is wrong, out of date, or should never have been saved.
Asking Claude to forget
Forget the old onboarding note in memors; it describes the previous tooling.
Claude asks for, or supplies, a short reason. The note then disappears from searches.
Its address keeps working, though. Anyone who follows an old link to it sees that it was forgotten, when, and why, instead of a dead end. That keeps the record honest.
What Claude may and may not forget
Claude can only forget things Claude saved. Things you saved yourself, or marked as checked, can only be removed by you. This prevents a mistaken or misled assistant from deleting your own records.
To remove something yourself, use the terminal with the item’s address:
memors-mcp forget memo://doc/01a1... --reason "replaced by the 2026 policy"
Removing text completely
Forgetting hides an item and keeps its text in history. If text must be erased, for example a
password pasted by mistake, add --redact:
memors-mcp forget memo://doc/01a1... --reason "contained a secret" --redact
The record that something was removed stays. The text itself is gone.
Keeping work separate
memors-mcp gives you two ways to keep things apart: shelves inside one memory, and separate memories.
Shelves: topics within one memory
A shelf is a label for a group of documents, such as billing, infrastructure or
grpc-docs. Questions search every shelf unless you say otherwise, so shelves organise
without hiding anything.
Save this on the billing shelf.
Only look on the infrastructure shelf.
Use shelves for topics within one project or team.
Separate memories: one per project or client
Each memory is its own file. Nothing in one can be found from another. Use separate memories when the contents must not mix, for example for different clients, or for work and personal notes.
The memory’s name is set when you connect memors-mcp to Claude. It is the MEMORS_KB value in
Quick start, step 2. To add a second memory, add memors-mcp again under
another name:
claude mcp add memors-client-b --env MEMORS_KB=client-b -- ~/bin/memors-mcp
In Claude Code, you can also set a memory per project folder, so each project automatically gets its own. The operator guide shows how.
| Use… | When |
|---|---|
| A shelf | Topics that may be searched together |
| A separate memory | Contents that must never mix |
Trust: who vouched for what
Every item in memors-mcp carries a trust level. It answers one question: who has vouched for this?
| Level | Meaning | How something gets it |
|---|---|---|
| Agent | Claude saved it. It may well be right, but no person has checked it. | Anything Claude saves |
| User | A person saved it or confirmed it. | Anything you save from the terminal, or Claude’s work you approve |
| Curated | Checked and approved as a reference source. | Only by a person, deliberately |
The level appears next to every search result, in the browser view and in what Claude tells you.
Why Claude cannot raise trust by itself
If an assistant could mark its own notes as verified, the label would mean nothing. A web page with misleading instructions could also persuade it to “verify” something false. So memors-mcp has one firm rule: only a person can raise trust.
Claude can ask. When it believes a note deserves more trust, it requests a promotion, and one of two things happens:
-
Your app shows a dialog. It contains the passage, where it came from and the level requested. Nothing changes unless you press accept.
-
Your app cannot show dialogs. Claude gives you a short command to run yourself, for example:
memors-mcp trust promote memo://doc/01a1... --to user
Every change of trust is recorded: who made it, when and why.
Warning. Some setups can be configured to accept every dialog automatically. If you do that, the trust labels lose their meaning. Treat everything as agent level.
Lowering trust
If something you trusted turns out to be wrong, lower it:
memors-mcp trust demote memo://doc/01a1... --to agent
How trust affects answers
Trust does not change how relevant a result is. A note Claude saved can still be the best match. What trust changes:
-
You can see it. Every answer shows whether it rests on something a person checked, or only on Claude’s own notes.
-
You can require it. Ask Claude to use only items at or above a level:
Answer only from items a person has checked.
-
It settles ties. When two facts disagree, the one with higher trust is preferred, then the newer one.
Looking inside
memors-mcp includes a browser view of your memory. It shows everything Claude can see, in the same order Claude would see it. It is read-only: nothing on it can change your memory, so it is safe to explore.
Opening it
In a terminal, using the same memory name as in your Claude setup:
MEMORS_KB=my-project memors-mcp ui
It prints an address such as http://127.0.0.1:54750. Open it in your browser. The page is
only reachable from your own computer. Press Ctrl-C in the terminal to stop it.
If you run memors-mcp as one shared server (memors-mcp serve --http 127.0.0.1:8765, see the
operator guide), the same view is already at http://127.0.0.1:8765/, with an extra Live
page. On a Mac, the menu-bar app shows who is connected at a glance and opens
the Live page in a window.
What you can do there
| Page | What it shows |
|---|---|
| Home | What the memory holds: counts of documents, facts and summary pages, each shelf, and the most recent documents |
| Search | The same search Claude uses, with the “why did this rank here” table for every result |
| Documents and passages | The full text, where it came from, who saved it, and every earlier version |
| Facts | Every fact with its timeline: when it became true, when it was replaced, and by what |
| Pages | Summary pages Claude has written, with the passages each one is based on |
| Names (follow a link from a page) | One person, system or term the memory mentions, with the passages about it and related names |
| Lint | Loose ends: contradicting facts, out-of-date summaries, expired facts |
Live (only with memors-mcp serve --http) | What the running server is doing right now: which clients are connected (name, version, and whether each one is connected, has its session open but is quiet, or has left), calls in flight and for how long, background work, and per-tool calls, errors and response times since it started. Reloads itself every 2 seconds |
| Ingest | Every time something was added, from memors-mcp ingest or from Claude: whether it is still running, how far it got, and how it went (documents written, unchanged or failed, passages, vectors still pending, size, time, documents per second). Click a run for one row per document. While a run is in progress the page reloads itself every 2 seconds; add ?refresh=off to stop that |
| Status | Size, settings, background work in progress and the last few ingests |
| Log | Recent questions and tool use, if you turned the log on |
When it helps
- Before you rely on an answer, open its source and read it in context.
- When results seem off, run the same search here and look at the “why” table.
- To show someone else what the team’s memory knows, without giving them Claude.
- To check what Claude saved during a long session.
The menu-bar app (macOS)
If you run memors-mcp as one shared server (memors-mcp serve --http, see
Looking inside), MemoRS Tray puts it in your menu bar. At a glance you
see which agents are connected right now, you can open the server’s live page in a window of
its own, and you can start and stop servers without a terminal.
Installing it
- Download
memors-tray_X.Y.Z_darwin_universal.zipfrom the releases page, unzip it and move MemoRS Tray.app to Applications. - Open it. The first time, macOS says it cannot check the developer: the app is not
notarized. Open System Settings › Privacy & Security and click Open Anyway. (Or, in a
terminal:
xattr -dr com.apple.quarantine "/Applications/MemoRS Tray.app".) - If memors-mcp is not installed yet, the setup assistant opens by itself (below). Otherwise
MemoRS Tray finds it in the usual places (
~/.local/bin,/opt/homebrew/bin,/usr/local/bin,~/go/bin).
The setup assistant
Install or Update memors-mcp… in the menu (or Install memors-mcp… at the top, when it is missing) walks you through four steps:
- Welcome: whether memors-mcp is installed, and which version.
- Install: MemoRS Tray looks up the newest release on GitHub and downloads the one for your
Mac. Before installing it checks the download against the checksums published with the
release and makes sure the program runs. The default folder is
~/.local/bin. If anything goes wrong, the memors-mcp you had stays as it was. After an update, Restart them restarts the servers MemoRS Tray started, so they run the new version. - Knowledge base: a name (pick an existing one or type a new one), the embedding model, whether a token is required, and whether the server starts with MemoRS Tray. Save and start starts it.
- Connect: the MCP address and the
claude mcp addline for Claude Code, with a Copy button.
MemoRS Tray contacts GitHub only while this assistant is open on the Install step.
What the menu shows
crportal · 127.0.0.1:8765 · running ▸
● claude-code 2.1.4 — search (3s)
○ cursor 1.2 — idle 12m
default · stopped ▸
Start Server ▸
Settings ▸
Quit MemoRS Tray (stops 1 server)
- One line per server: its memory’s name, its address and its state. The submenu (▸) has everything you can do with it.
- Under each server, one line per connected agent:
- ● the agent is busy (the call it is running is shown) or connected and active;
- ○ its connection is open but it has been quiet.
- The number next to the menu-bar icon counts the ● agents.
An agent disappears from the list when it disconnects. One that stays quiet for more than 30 minutes is dropped by the server and shows up again with its next request.
Starting and stopping servers
- Start Server ▸ lists your memories. Pick one and MemoRS Tray starts a server for it on
127.0.0.1:8765, or the next free port. It remembers the address, so the URL you give your agents never changes. - Copy “claude mcp add” Command in a server’s submenu puts the line that connects Claude Code on the clipboard. Paste it in a terminal once.
- Stop, Restart and Show Log are in the same submenu. Servers you started in a terminal appear too, and you can stop them from here.
- Quitting MemoRS Tray stops the servers it started. To keep them running, set
"stop_on_quit": false.
The stats window
Open Stats Window shows the server’s Live page in a window of its own: connected clients, calls in flight, per-tool timings and ingest progress, refreshed every 2 seconds. The other pages (search, documents, facts) work in the window too. Links that leave the server open in your normal browser.
If the server asks for a token, the window logs in by itself. There is nothing to paste.
Settings
Settings… in the menu opens the settings window:
- General: open MemoRS Tray when you log in; stop the servers it started when it quits.
- memors-mcp: which memors-mcp runs and its version, with Check for updates…; find it automatically or use a specific file; the embedding model for every server MemoRS Tray starts.
- Servers: each knowledge base MemoRS Tray can start, with its address, whether it needs a token, and whether it starts with MemoRS Tray; add or remove one (removing never deletes the knowledge base itself).
- Advanced: extra environment for the servers, and the Web Inspector for MemoRS Tray’s
windows. Links open
tray.jsonand the logs folder.
The window shows what is saved in ~/.memors-mcp/tray.json. You can also edit the file by hand:
{
"servers": [
{ "kb": "crportal", "addr": "127.0.0.1:8765", "autostart": true },
{ "kb": "work", "addr": "127.0.0.1:8766", "auth": "token" }
],
"env": { "MEMORS_MODEL": "potion" },
"stop_on_quit": true
}
autostartstarts that server whenever MemoRS Tray starts.auth: "token"keeps other people on a shared Mac out (see the operator guide).envpasses settings to every server MemoRS Tray starts. Apps opened from the Dock do not see your terminal’s variables, so put settings such asMEMORS_MODELhere.memors_binaryis the memors-mcp to run; the setup assistant sets it to what it installed.
Logs live in ~/.memors-mcp/logs/: one file per server (serve-<name>.log) and tray.log.
Keeping it tidy
A memory that grows for months collects loose ends:
- facts that contradict each other;
- two names for the same thing, such as “Postgres” and “PostgreSQL”;
- near-duplicate notes;
- topics mentioned in many places but never summarised.
memors-mcp finds these. It does not fix them on its own. Claude does the writing, and you decide anything that matters.
Asking Claude to tidy up
Tidy up the memors knowledge base.
Claude asks memors-mcp for a to-do list. Each item comes with the material needed to handle it:
- Write a summary page for a topic mentioned in many places. Claude writes it from the saved passages. Each sentence points back to its source.
- Refresh an out-of-date page. A summary is marked stale when a document it was based on changes.
- Resolve a contradiction between two facts by keeping the right one.
- Merge two names that mean the same thing.
Checks on every summary
When Claude hands a summary back, memors-mcp checks it before keeping it:
- Did it leave anything out? Important facts about the topic that the page does not mention are reported.
- Did it make anything up? Sentences that the sources do not support are flagged.
- What changed? For a refreshed page, you see the difference from the previous version.
Summary pages are always labelled as written by Claude, with their sources listed, so they never pass for original material.
Decisions that stay with you
Merging two names and settling contradictions affect what the memory treats as true. Claude can propose them, and you can confirm them in the conversation or from the terminal. Nothing is merged silently.
Tip. Once a month, ask “Is there anything in memors that needs my decision?” Claude will list the open items.
Use cases
Project memory for a codebase
The situation. Every Claude session on your project starts by re-reading the same files and re-learning the same conventions.
With memors-mcp. Save the architecture notes, conventions and “why we did it this way” explanations once. Claude looks them up when they are relevant. When the code changes, ask Claude to save the new version. The old one stays as history.
At the end of a working session: “Save to memors what we learned today about the payment retry logic, and why we chose exponential backoff.”
Documentation pinned to the version you use
The situation. Libraries change between versions, and assistants mix them up.
With memors-mcp. Have Claude fetch and save the documentation for the exact version you use, labelled with that version. Questions then get answers for your version.
“Fetch the gRPC Go docs on deadlines for version 1.64 and save them to memors.”
Team decisions and their reasons
The situation. Six months later, nobody remembers why a decision was made, and it gets argued again.
With memors-mcp. Save each decision with its reason and date. Record the outcome as a fact. When it changes, record the new fact as replacing the old one. The history shows when and why.
“Remember that we chose Postgres over MongoDB on 12 May because we need transactions across accounts. Link it to the meeting notes.”
Research notes
The situation. You read many sources, and later cannot find which one said what.
With memors-mcp. Have Claude save each source with its address and a one-line context. Ask questions across all of them. Every answer names its source, and you can open the exact passage.
Onboarding a new teammate
The situation. A new person spends weeks absorbing knowledge nobody wrote down.
With memors-mcp. The team’s memory is already there. The newcomer can browse it in the browser view or ask Claude questions against it. Trust labels show which answers a person has checked.
Support and operations runbooks
The situation. During an incident, you need the procedure that is current now.
With memors-mcp. Save runbooks and record key facts, such as on-call contacts, limits and endpoints. Facts that change are corrected rather than duplicated, so the current answer is always the one that comes back.
Privacy and safety
Where your information lives
Everything is stored in one file on your computer, in a folder called .memors-mcp in your
home folder. Only your user account can open that folder. There is no cloud copy, no account
and no sync.
What leaves your computer
Almost nothing. The first time memors-mcp starts, it downloads a language model of about 140 MB from Hugging Face, a public model library. That is the only time it contacts the internet. After that it works fully offline.
memors-mcp itself never visits websites. When you ask Claude to save a web page, Claude fetches it and hands over the text.
There is no telemetry, no usage reporting and no analytics.
Two things to be aware of
- The memory file is not encrypted. Anyone who can open files in your home folder can read it. Do not store passwords or secrets in it. If you saved one by mistake, remove it completely; see Forgetting things.
- Claude sees what it saves and searches. The words go through Claude, as everything in a conversation does. memors-mcp adds no extra exposure, but it does not hide anything from Claude either.
Safety rules built in
- Claude cannot vouch for itself. Only a person can raise an item’s trust. See Trust.
- Claude cannot delete your records. It can only remove what Claude saved.
- Nothing is silently overwritten. Changes create new versions, and the old ones stay in history.
- The browser view cannot change anything, and it is only reachable from your own computer.
- The optional activity log is off by default. If you turn it on, it records which tools were used and how long they took, but never the text you saved or read.
Backing up and moving
Your memory is a single file, so backing it up is copying it. See Questions and troubleshooting for moving it to another computer.
Questions and troubleshooting
Claude doesn’t seem to see memors
- Claude Code: type
/mcp.memorsshould be listed as connected. If it shows an error, the message usually says what is wrong. - Claude Desktop: quit it completely, not just the window, and open it again. Check that
the path in the settings file is the full path to the program, starting with
/on a Mac orC:\on Windows. - Shared server (
memors-mcp serve --http): check that the terminal running it is still open and shows no error, then run/mcpin Claude Code to reconnect. The address inclaude mcp addmust end in/mcpand use the same port the server prints. - On a Mac, the program may be blocked the first time. See Quick start, step 1.
It found nothing
- It may really not be there. memors-mcp says “nothing found” instead of guessing. Ask Claude to save the answer once it finds it elsewhere.
- You may be looking in a different memory. Each memory has a name. If Claude was set up
with
my-projectand you saved things under another name, they are in a different file. Ask Claude “What is in my memors knowledge base?” to see which one it uses. - The question may be limited to one shelf or version. Ask again without the limit.
Results feel off
- Ask “Why did that come first?” The explanation often shows the cause: an old note, a weak match, or the wrong version.
- Open the same search in the browser view and look at the sources.
- Save a better source, or correct the fact. Old, wrong notes can be forgotten; see Forgetting things.
Claude says search is “degraded”
The language model that matches by meaning is not ready. This is normal for a few minutes after the first start, or after switching models, while it downloads or catches up. Search still works by matching words. If it lasts, the computer may have no internet access for the one-time download. Ask whoever set it up, or see the operator guide.
Is my information sent anywhere?
No. See Privacy and safety. The only download is the one-time language model.
Can I move my memory to another computer?
Yes. Your memory is one file:
- Close Claude on the old computer, so the file is not in use.
- Copy the file from the
.memors-mcp/kbfolder in your home folder. Its name is the memory name followed by.db, for examplemy-project.db. - Install memors-mcp on the new computer (Quick start), and put the file in the same folder there.
The language model downloads again on the new computer the first time.
How do I back it up?
Close Claude, then copy the same file somewhere safe. To back it up while Claude is open, see Backup and restore in the operator guide.
Can several people share one memory?
memors-mcp is built for one person on one computer. A team can share by exporting the memory as documents, or by having one person curate a memory others browse. Simultaneous use over a network drive is not supported.
Can I read my memory without Claude?
Yes. Use the browser view. An operator can also export everything as ordinary documents that open in any editor or in Obsidian.
Where do I get help?
Open an issue on GitHub. Describe what you asked and what happened, but do not include anything private.
Words we use
| Word | What it means here |
|---|---|
| Address | A short link that starts with memo://, pointing at exactly one saved item. It keeps working even if the item is later forgotten |
| Agent | An AI assistant, such as Claude, that uses tools on your behalf. Also the lowest trust level: “Claude saved this” |
| Browser view | The read-only web page that shows your memory: memors-mcp ui |
| Curated | The highest trust level: checked and approved as a reference source |
| Degraded | Searching works, but only by matching words, because the meaning-matching model is not ready |
| Document | Anything longer you saved: a note, a guide, a web page, meeting notes |
| Embedding | The way a language model turns text into numbers so it can match meaning rather than exact words. You never need to handle them |
| Fact | One short statement worth keeping on its own, with a date range and a source |
| Forget | Remove an item from searches, keeping a record that it was removed, when and why |
| History | Earlier versions of documents and facts, kept when something changes |
| Language model | The downloaded file that lets memors-mcp match by meaning. It is downloaded once and runs on your computer |
| MCP | Model Context Protocol: the standard way Claude plugs into tools like memors-mcp |
| Memory, or knowledge base | Everything memors-mcp holds for one project, kept in one file |
| Page | A summary Claude wrote about one topic, built from saved passages and pointing back to them |
| Passage | A short piece of a document, a few paragraphs long. Searches find passages, then show the document they came from |
| Promote | Raise an item’s trust level. Only a person can do it |
| Shelf | A label that groups documents within one memory, such as billing or infrastructure. Technically called a namespace |
| Stale | A summary page whose sources changed after it was written; it needs a refresh |
| Trust | Who has vouched for an item: Claude (agent), a person (user), or a checked reference (curated) |
| User | The middle trust level: a person saved or confirmed it |