v0.8.0 MCP Connection Issues

[abhishekag03-cb]

We recently upgraded our LibreChat version from v0.7.9 to v0.8.0.

Most users are now experiencing issues with MCP connectivity in the chat window. After selecting the MCP, we get a confirmation message saying - “MCP [X] initialised successfully “, but the MCP never gets selected.

It used to work seamlessly till v0.7.9. Intermittently it’s working on Incognito for some users.

Is there a caching issue? Has anyone faced this earlier? Any suggestions on how to deterministically solve this?

Any help would be appreciated. It's currently blocking MCP connectivity for most of our users. Thanks!

[abhishekag03-cb]

Here's a video recording of what I'm talking about.

Selecting MCP before sending the first message never works. After the first message, I'm able to select it.

Screen.Recording.2025-11-05.at.11.56.08.PM.mov

[abhishekag03-cb]

cc: @danny-avila any help on debugging the MCP connections would be appreciated 🙏
I have already disabled Redis, but that did not make a difference.

Thanks a lot!

[danny-avila]

A lot of fixes and improvements were made as of latest version/commits, i recommend updating from v0.8.0

[abhishekag03-cb]

@danny-avila I upgraded to v0.8.1-rc1, but in that the LIBRECHAT_USER_EMAIL environment variable is not getting passed. Did we change any logic there? It's getting passed without being substituted.
Here's my MCP config from librechat.yaml (which used to work perfectly fine earlier)

glean:
    command: npx
    timeout: 120000
    initTimeout: 120000
    args:
      - -y
      - --registry
      - https://registry-npm.cbhq.net
      - "@cbhq/[email protected]"
    headers:
      X-Source: "LibreChat"
      X-LibreChat-User-Id: "{{LIBRECHAT_USER_ID}}"
      X-LibreChat-User-Role: "{{LIBRECHAT_USER_ROLE}}"
      x-lgw-user-email: "{{LIBRECHAT_USER_EMAIL}}"
    env:
      USER_EMAIL: "{{LIBRECHAT_USER_EMAIL}}"
    chatMenu: true

The env var USER_EMAIL does not contain the value of user email. I have verified it for other MCP servers as well.

Is this only allowed in headers or something?

[abhishekag03-cb]

FYI: I am using Okta as my auth provider and here's the Okta config.

    OPENID_ISSUER: "https://<my_issuer>"
    OPENID_SCOPE: "openid profile email offline_access"
    OPENID_CALLBACK_URL: "/oauth/openid/callback"
    OPENID_AUTH_ENABLED: "true"
    OPENID_AUTO_REDIRECT: "true"
    OPENID_BUTTON_LABEL: "Continue with Okta"
    OPENID_IMAGE_URL: "https://www.okta.com/sites/default/files/Okta_Logo_BrightBlue_Medium.png"
    OPENID_JWKS_URL_CACHE_ENABLED: "false"

[danny-avila]

Since you're using stdio type (not recommended for multi-user context), you need to add an additional config, startup: false:

glean:
    command: npx
    timeout: 120000
    initTimeout: 120000
    args:
      - -y
      - --registry
      - https://registry-npm.cbhq.net
      - "@cbhq/[email protected]"
    headers:
      X-Source: "LibreChat"
      X-LibreChat-User-Id: "{{LIBRECHAT_USER_ID}}"
      X-LibreChat-User-Role: "{{LIBRECHAT_USER_ROLE}}"
      x-lgw-user-email: "{{LIBRECHAT_USER_EMAIL}}"
    env:
      USER_EMAIL: "{{LIBRECHAT_USER_EMAIL}}"
    chatMenu: true
    startup: false

[abhishekag03-cb]

Interesting, this worked. Earlier this used to work even with startup: true.
Thanks a lot @danny-avila !

[danny-avila]

Great!

[abhishekag03-cb]

@danny-avila since you mentioned:

you're using stdio type (not recommended for multi-user context)

May I know what's the recommended method for multi user context MCPs?

Also, the concern I raised here still holds - I have upgraded to v0.8.1-rc1 as well.

Can you please assist on how this can be fixed? Users are finding it very inconvenient to use the MCPs since after the upgrade from v0.7.9. Thanks!

[abhishekag03-cb]

@danny-avila it was much easier when we could have startup: false and still the environment variables were passed in dynamically.
That way, we did not have to wait for the MCP to initialise every time in the chat window. Now for enabling each MCP, I have to wait for about 15 seconds to build the connection with my env vars.

Any reasons why we changed this after v0.7.9? Thanks!