How to integrate Cats MCP with Codex

Codex is one of the most popular coding harnesses out there. And MCP makes the experience even better. With Cats MCP integration, you can draft, triage, summarise emails, and much more, all without leaving the terminal or the app, whichever you prefer.

Cats logoCats
Api Key

Cats is an API with a huge library of cat images, breed data, and cat facts. It makes finding adorable cat photos and trivia effortless for your apps and users.

18 Tools

Introduction

Codex is one of the most popular coding harnesses out there. And MCP makes the experience even better. With Cats MCP integration, you can draft, triage, summarise emails, and much more, all without leaving the terminal or the app, whichever you prefer.

Also integrate Cats with

Why use Composio?

Apart from a managed and hosted MCP server, you will get:

  • CodeAct: A dedicated workbench that allows GPT to write its code to handle complex tool chaining. Reduces to-and-fro with LLMs for frequent tool calling.
  • Large tool responses: Handle them to minimise context rot.
  • Dynamic just-in-time access to 20,000 tools across 1000+ other Apps for cross-app workflows. It loads the tools you need, so GPTs aren't overwhelmed by tools you don't need.

How to install Cats MCP in Codex

Run the setup command

Run this command in your terminal to add the Composio MCP server to Codex.

Terminal

It will initiate the authentication in a browser window, authorize Codex to access your Composio account.

Composio authentication page

(Optional) Authenticate with OAuth

To authenticate manually, run the login command to open a browser window and authorize Codex to access your Composio account.

bash
codex mcp login composio

Verify the connection

Run codex mcp list to confirm Composio appears as a registered MCP server.

bash
codex mcp list

Codex App

Codex App follows the same approach as VS Code.

  1. Click ⚙️ on the bottom left → MCP Servers → + Add servers → Streamable HTTP:
  2. Fill the header and Key fields with { "x-consumer-api-key" = "ck_*******" }.
  3. The Key is the Composio API key, that you can find on dashboard.composio.dev
  4. Click on Authenticate and authorize Codex to your Composio account and you're all set.
Codex App MCP setup
  1. Restart and verify if it's there in .codex/config.toml
bash
[mcp_servers.composio]
url = "https://connect.composio.dev/mcp"
http_headers = { "x-consumer-api-key" = "ck_*******" }

What is the Cats MCP server, and what's possible with it?

The Cats MCP server is an implementation of the Model Context Protocol that connects your AI agent and assistants like Claude, Cursor, etc directly to your Cats account. It provides structured and secure access to a wide collection of cat images, breed information, and fun feline facts, so your agent can fetch cat data, browse curated cat images, and pull breed details on your behalf.

  • Portals listing for cat resources: Instruct your agent to list and browse all available cat-related portals, making it easy to explore organized collections of cat images and data.
  • Metadata exploration with pagination: Have your agent efficiently page through vast cat collections, ensuring you can access just the right portal or dataset without missing a thing.
  • On-demand cat image discovery: Let your agent find and retrieve high-quality cat images from the API’s large, curated library—perfect for enrichment or just a dose of cuteness.
  • Access to detailed breed and fact data: Ask your agent to pull up detailed info on cat breeds and fun facts, making it a handy assistant for both research and entertainment.

Conclusion

You've successfully integrated Cats with Codex using Composio's MCP server. Now you can interact with Cats directly from your terminal, VS Code, or the Codex App using natural language commands.

Key benefits of this setup:

  • Seamless integration across CLI, VS Code, and standalone app
  • Natural language commands for Cats operations
  • Managed authentication through Composio
  • Access to 20,000+ tools across 1000+ apps for cross-app workflows
  • CodeAct workbench for complex tool chaining

Next steps:

  • Try asking Codex to perform various Cats operations
  • Explore cross-app workflows by connecting more toolkits
  • Build automation scripts that leverage Codex's AI capabilities
TOOLS

Supported Tools

Every Cats action and event your agent gets out of the box.

Create Favourite

Tool to save an image as a favourite to your account.

Create Vote

Tool to vote on a cat image.

Delete Favourite

Tool to delete a favourite from your account by its ID.

Delete Image

Delete an uploaded image from your account by its ID.

Delete Vote

Tool to delete a vote from your account by its ID.

Get Cat Breed by ID

Tool to get detailed information about a specific cat breed by its ID.

Get Favourite by ID

Tool to retrieve a specific favourite by its unique ID.

Get Cat Image by ID

Tool to retrieve a specific cat image by its unique ID.

Get Image Analysis

Get machine learning analysis results for an uploaded image.

Get Image Breeds

Tool to retrieve breed information associated with a specific cat image.

Get Cat Breeds

Retrieves a paginated list of cat breeds from The Cat API.

Get Vote by ID

Retrieves a specific vote by its unique ID from The Cat API.

List Image Categories

Retrieves a list of all active image categories from The Cat API.

List Favourites

Tool to get all favourites belonging to your account.

List Uploaded Images

Tool to get all images uploaded to your account via /images/upload.

List Votes

Tool to retrieve all votes you have created.

Search Cat Breeds

Search for cat breeds by name.

Search Cat Images

Search for random cat images with optional filters.

FAQ

Frequently asked questions

With a standalone Cats MCP server, the agents and LLMs can only access a fixed set of Cats tools tied to that server. However, with the Composio Tool Router, agents can dynamically load tools from Cats and many other apps based on the task at hand, all through a single MCP endpoint.

Yes, you can. Codex fully supports MCP integration. You get structured tool calling, message history handling, and model orchestration while Tool Router takes care of discovering and serving the right Cats tools.

Yes, absolutely. You can configure which Cats scopes and actions are allowed when connecting your account to Composio. You can also bring your own OAuth credentials or API configuration so you keep full control over what the agent can do.

All sensitive data such as tokens, keys, and configuration is fully encrypted at rest and in transit. Composio is SOC 2 Type 2 compliant and follows strict security practices so your Cats data and credentials are handled as safely as possible.

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