Release 1.24.0 - Local MCP Servers, Custom Headers, and Branding

May 2026

Upgrading from 1.23.0

This section covers everything you need to know to upgrade from 1.23.0 to 1.24.0.

Breaking Changes

There are no breaking changes in this release. All new functionality is additive and backwards compatible:

• The new deployment field on servers defaults to remote, preserving existing remote-server behavior.
• The new UI_TITLE env var defaults to the deployment-mode-aware string ("AI Gateway & Registry" for with-gateway, "AI Registry" for registry-only), so existing deployments see no change unless they explicitly set the variable.
• APP_LOG_CONSOLE_FORMAT flips its default from text to json for log-agent scraping. Operators who prefer human-readable stdout can set APP_LOG_CONSOLE_FORMAT=text to opt back in.
• Custom HTTP headers per server are entirely opt-in.

New Environment Variables

Upgrade Instructions

Docker Compose

cd mcp-gateway-registry
git pull origin main
git checkout 1.24.0

# Review new env vars in .env.example and update your .env if needed
# Then rebuild and restart:
./build_and_run.sh

Kubernetes / Helm (EKS)

REQUIRED: Subchart templates, values, and helpers changed in this release. The packaged .tgz subcharts inside charts/mcp-gateway-registry-stack/charts/ must be rebuilt - a plain git pull is not sufficient, you will silently use the old subchart packages.

cd mcp-gateway-registry
git pull origin main
git checkout 1.24.0

# REQUIRED: Rebuild subchart packages so the stack chart picks up the
# updated registry, mcpgw, and auth-server templates and values.
cd charts/mcp-gateway-registry-stack
helm dependency build
helm dependency update

# Update values.yaml if needed, then upgrade:
helm upgrade mcp-gateway . -f your-values.yaml

Terraform / ECS

cd mcp-gateway-registry
git pull origin main
git checkout 1.24.0

# Update your .tfvars with any new variables
cd terraform/aws-ecs
terraform plan
terraform apply

DockerHub Images

Pre-built images are available:

docker pull mcpgateway/registry:1.24.0
docker pull mcpgateway/auth-server:1.24.0
docker pull mcpgateway/currenttime-server:1.24.0
docker pull mcpgateway/realserverfaketools-server:1.24.0
docker pull mcpgateway/mcpgw-server:1.24.0
docker pull mcpgateway/fininfo-server:1.24.0
docker pull mcpgateway/metrics-service:1.24.0

Major Features

Local (stdio) MCP Server Support

Register local MCP servers that run on developer machines via stdio (npx, uvx, docker, command) alongside remote HTTP-proxied servers. The registry stores a launch recipe and surfaces it as IDE-ready config (Claude Code, Cursor, Roo Code, Kiro, Goose) through the Connect modal. No health checks, no nginx proxy, no security scanning for local servers (they have no HTTP endpoint to probe).

Highlights:

• Heuristic secret-leak detection at registration time (rejects literal tokens in env values)
• Automatic unpinned-version tagging for packages without a version pin
• Admin-only registration; security-pending-local tag workflow for manual review
• Federation peers can opt in to syncing local recipes via a sync_local_servers flag (default off)

PR #1038, FAQ

Custom HTTP Headers per MCP Server

Attach up to 10 custom HTTP headers to any registered MCP server. Header values are Fernet-encrypted at rest (never exposed in listing APIs) and decrypted on demand for the Connect modal and proxied requests. Headers are injected into upstream health checks and tool-fetch requests before auth_scheme headers (defense-in-depth merge order).

Highlights:

• RFC 7230 token validation, reserved gateway headers blocklisted (Authorization, Host, etc.), CRLF injection prevention, max 10 per server
• Edit supports partial-update semantics (empty value preserves existing ciphertext)
• New GET /api/servers/{path}/connect-config endpoint for the Connect button
• CLI: server-connect-config subcommand and --custom-header NAME=VALUE on server-update-credential

PR #1041

Configurable UI Title with Deployment-Mode-Aware Defaults

A new UI_TITLE parameter lets operators brand the deployment with their organization's product name (e.g., "Acme AI Portal") without forking the frontend. When unset, the title defaults based on DEPLOYMENT_MODE (AI Gateway & Registry for with-gateway, AI Registry for registry-only), fixing the misleading "Gateway" label in registry-only deployments.

The title is rendered in the top-left header, Login page, Logout footer, uptime tooltip, and browser tab. Plumbed through Docker, Terraform, and Helm; documented in the unified parameter reference.

PR #1043, FAQ

JSON Console Logging by Default

A new APP_LOG_CONSOLE_FORMAT env var switches stdout output between json (structured JSON Lines, the new default) and text (human-readable). Defaulting to JSON makes container logs immediately consumable by log agents and sidecars (Datadog, CloudWatch, Splunk) without parsing. The same parameter controls all three services (registry, auth-server, mcpgw).

PR #1040

Tool-Level Access Control in List/Response APIs

The registry now enforces tool-level access control on GET /api/servers, GET /api/server_details, and the MCP tools/list JSON-RPC response. Users only see the tools they have execute scopes for. Includes an audit log of filtered-out tools at a configurable log level.

PR #1027 (Closes #1026)

Resource-Bound JWT Tokens

JWT tokens minted via the token-vending endpoint can now be bound to a specific resource (server path, agent path, or virtual server) so leaked tokens cannot be reused against other resources. Audit logs include the bound resource for forensic visibility.

PR #1010 (Closes #944)

Multi-Replica airegistry-tools Support

The built-in airegistry-tools MCP server now runs correctly behind a load balancer with multiple replicas. Sticky-session handling and shared state are correctly configured.

PR #1021 (Closes #960)

IPv6 Dual-Stack Server Bind Support

Server bind addresses now support IPv6 dual-stack (::), enabling deployment on IPv6-only Kubernetes clusters. BIND_HOST defaults to 0.0.0.0 for backwards compatibility; operators can opt in to :: explicitly.

PR #864 (Closes #863)

What's New

Frontend Improvements

• Add Skills (JSON array) field to Agent Quick Form registration (#1046) - closes #1045
• Filter list of IDEs for MCP servers (#912)
• Add Goose as a connection option from the UI (#1018)

Helm and Deployment

• Make ALB ingress scheme configurable with 3-tier override (#967)
• Extra-env surface parity for Docker Compose and Terraform (#1019) - closes #1000
• uv.lock usage for Docker and mcpgw embeddings cleanup (#1024) - closes #1022

Skills and Documentation

• Add active-instances chart and LTV-spend generators to usage-report skill (#1025)
• Add debug skill for first-principles root-cause analysis (commit 7207c98)
• Local MCP servers FAQ and What's New entry (commit 08dca18)

Security and Audit

• Default BIND_HOST to 0.0.0.0; keep :: as opt-in (#1016)
• Log authenticated users by name on /api/stats and public reads (#1014)

Bug Fixes

• Use update_agent instead of register_agent for security-pending tag application (#1035) - closes #1032, #1033
• Remove missed mcpgw ingress cleanup (#1017)
• Fix GitHub helm workflow (#1012)

Closed Issues

Pull Requests Included

Security Dependency Updates

Contributors

Thank you to all contributors for this release:

• omrishiv (@omrishiv)
• Amit Arora (@aarora79)
• Prateek Sinha (@shekharprateek)
• Soheil Safari (@soheilsf)
• Max Peshkov (@mpeshkov)
• dependabot[bot] (@dependabot)

Support

• GitHub Issues
• GitHub Discussions
• Documentation

Full Changelog: 1.23.0...1.24.0