Installation

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Install FastMCP

We recommend using uv to install and manage FastMCP.

If you plan to use FastMCP in your project, you can add it as a dependency with:

uv add fastmcp

Alternatively, you can install it directly with pip or uv pip:

uv pip install fastmcp

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Verify Installation

To verify that FastMCP is installed correctly, you can run the following command:

fastmcp version

You should see output like the following:

$ fastmcp version

FastMCP version:   0.4.2.dev41+ga077727.d20250410
MCP version:                                1.6.0
Python version:                            3.12.2
Platform:            macOS-15.3.1-arm64-arm-64bit
FastMCP root path:            ~/Developer/fastmcp

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Upgrading from the Official MCP SDK

Upgrading from the official MCP SDK’s FastMCP 1.0 to FastMCP 2.0 is generally straightforward. The core server API is highly compatible, and in many cases, changing your import statement from from mcp.server.fastmcp import FastMCP to from fastmcp import FastMCP will be sufficient.

# Before
# from mcp.server.fastmcp import FastMCP

# After
from fastmcp import FastMCP

mcp = FastMCP("My MCP Server")

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Installing for Development

If you plan to contribute to FastMCP, you should begin by cloning the repository and using uv to install all dependencies (development dependencies are installed automatically):

git clone https://github.com/jlowin/fastmcp.git
cd fastmcp
uv sync

This will install all dependencies, including ones for development, and create a virtual environment, which you can activate and use as normal.

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Unit Tests

FastMCP has a comprehensive unit test suite, and all PR’s must introduce and pass appropriate tests. To run the tests, use pytest:

pytest

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Pre-Commit Hooks

FastMCP uses pre-commit to manage code quality, including formatting, linting, and type-safety. All PRs must pass the pre-commit hooks, which are run as a part of the CI process. To install the pre-commit hooks, run:

uv run pre-commit install

Alternatively, to run pre-commit manually at any time, use:

pre-commit run --all-files