Item detail
github.com

kerlenton/mcpsnoop

RepoRadar surfaced kerlenton/mcpsnoop — an MCP server — into the AI Agents section, where it sits at Gold tier with a 'try now' verdict. Its strongest signal is workflow potential, scored 10.0 out of 10.

Score8.5
Popularity1.0
Risklow
TierGold
Score breakdown
Usefulness9.0
Novelty9.0
Momentum7.0
Maturity6.6
Open-source/build8.4
Evidence7.2
Workflow potential10.0
Setup ease8.8

Popularity is tracked separately. Support, ads, sponsorships, and tips never affect these signals.

Why it matters

Useful for MCP server authors, MCP client authors, agent harness developers, and anyone debugging 'the tool was supposed to be called but never was' or 'the call hung' mysteries in Claude Desktop / Cursor / Claude Code — the canonical replacement for `tail -f /tmp/some.log` and the right primitive for closing the gap between an MCP server's intended API and the calls a real client actually makes.

Who should use it

MCP server authors debugging 'the tool silently wasn't called / capabilities don't line up / the call hangs' mysteries in production — replace the server command in your Claude Desktop / Cursor / Claude Code MCP config with `mcpsnoop -- <your-server-command>` and watch the live JSON-RPC frame stream in the terminal as the real client drives the server MCP client authors reverse-engineering what a real client actually sends vs. what the docs say — run `mcpsnoop -- <server-command>` against your own server and let the TUI show what the client's JSON-RPC frames look like in practice (capability negotiation, request batching, notification timing) Agent harness developers building a Claude Desktop / Cursor / Claude Code workflow that depends on an MCP server — point the harness at `mcpsnoop --` wrapped server, watch the live traffic while running the agent loop, and see which tools the agent actually invoked (vs. which it thought it invoked) Anyone evaluating MCP for the first time — run `mcpsnoop demo` for a scripted zero-setup tour that plays into the live UI; you see real JSON-RPC frames without writing any client or server

Who should skip it

Move on from kerlenton/mcpsnoop if the licensing terms, language support, or platform requirements do not fit your project.

About this signal

kerlenton/mcpsnoop is tracked by RepoRadar as an MCP server in the AI Agents section. First seen 2026-07-03; the source record was last checked on 2026-07-03. The current verdict is 'try now' with a Gold tier and easy setup difficulty. Across RepoRadar's eight signals, kerlenton/mcpsnoop is strongest on workflow potential (10.0) and practical usefulness (9.0) and weakest on maturity (6.6) — a profile worth weighing against your own priorities. This page summarizes the public evidence on the linked source page and states where additional review is still needed.

How this item is evaluated

The kerlenton/mcpsnoop record combines a 8.5/10 composite score with separate popularity (1.0), risk (low), and setup (easy) signals. See the scoring methodology for the current weights and evidence definitions.

Putting this into practice? Read How to vet an AI agent or MCP server before you wire it in for the checklist behind this score.

Risk explanation

mcpsnoop is a transparent proxy in the real data path between your MCP client and your MCP server — the JSON-RPC frames the TUI shows include the full request payloads (tool name, arguments, file paths, auth tokens) and the full response payloads. Run mcpsnoop on the same machine that owns the client, not on a shared or multi-tenant host, and clear the TUI scrollback before sharing a screen recording or a log capture; The `mcpsnoop demo` scripted tour runs in a self-contained session but it still exercises a real MCP server–client interaction — review the `mcpsnoop --` wrap command and the demo's payload content before running on a workstation that has production MCP servers configured, and pin the demo to a non-production MCP server (e.g. a dev/test server) to keep production traffic on a different debug path; The Go single-binary install path (`go install github.com/kerlenton/mcpsnoop@latest`) requires a Go toolchain on the dev machine; for non-Go environments, use the release binary from the GitHub Releases page. The CLI's `--` separator is the only wrap-pattern contract — verify your MCP client preserves the `--` separator when launching the server (some clients strip trailing args; if you see 'command not found' on the server, check the client config first).

Evidence links
Closest alternatives / related signals
mcp mcp-debugger wireshark-for-mcp json-rpc transparent-proxy live-tui go claude-desktop
Verification record

What RepoRadar actually verified

Discovered

Automated discovery and source capture. Last checked 2026-08-13T20:20:15Z.

No editorial or hands-on review is claimed. This record remains at Discovered.

Verification sources

Longitudinal intelligence

How this decision record is moving

Raw history JSON →

32 dated snapshots retained from 2026-07-04 through 2026-08-13; see the snapshot index for explicit coverage gaps. Stars, version, release, pricing, integration, risk, maintenance, verdict, score, and momentum fields remain explicit even when a source has not reported them. Repository momentum is a normalized 0–10 RepoRadar signal; GitHub stars appear only where the popularity monitor retained exact timestamped observations.

RepoRadar score8.5 current · +0.0 net
Repository momentum9.0 current · +2.0 net
GitHub stars (observed)337 current · +77 net
GitHub stars337 exact observation
Versionv0.18.0
Last release2026-08-08T20:11:58Z
Maintenanceactive
Current risklow
Current verdicttry now
Pricing baselineNo structured commercial pricing baseline
Pricing checkedNot applicable or not recorded
Pricing freshnessNo dated commercial pricing review
Integrations baselineClaude, Model Context Protocol, OpenAI Codex

Recent dated points

DateScoreMomentumStarsRiskVerdictMaintenance
2026-08-138.59.0337lowtry nowactive
2026-08-128.59.3336lowtry nowactive
2026-08-118.59.3333lowtry nowactive
2026-08-108.59.3330lowtry nowactive
2026-08-098.59.0329lowtry nowactive
2026-08-088.59.0328lowtry nowactive
2026-08-078.59.3324lowtry nowactive
2026-08-068.57.0Not recordedlowtry nownot recorded
2026-08-058.57.0Not recordedlowtry nownot recorded
2026-08-048.59.3324lowtry nowactive
2026-08-038.59.3324lowtry nowactive
2026-08-028.59.0322lowtry nowactive

Why the record changed

stars changed

Stars changed: 336 → 337.

stars changed

Stars changed: 333 → 336.

stars changed

Stars changed: 330 → 333.

stars changed

Stars changed: 329 → 330.

version changed

Version changed: v0.17.0 → v0.18.0.

stars changed

Stars changed: 328 → 329.

stars changed

Stars changed: 324 → 328.

stars changed

Stars changed: 322 → 324.

stars changed

Stars changed: 321 → 322.

stars changed

Stars changed: 308 → 313.

stars changed

Source-observed stars changed: 304 → 308. This reports the retained observation delta and does not infer why the upstream change occurred.

stars changed

Stars changed: 271 → 304.