The Best Smithery Alternatives in 2026

What is changing at Smithery

Smithery's own notice says that on October 31, 2026 it shuts down its connection management services. The list is specific: server URLs on run.tools and server.smithery.ai, the Smithery API, Connect and Toolbox, Smithery accounts and API keys all stop, and the Smithery CLI and SDKs are on the same list, with their current versions to be marked deprecated. What stays is smithery.ai as a public, non-proxied MCP registry, now powered by Arcade.dev, with a curated set of verified servers whose pages will show the vendor's direct MCP URL, for example mcp.linear.app/mcp. Paid users are refunded for every charge since August 5 and their subscriptions are cancelled. Arcade.dev announced on August 5, 2026 that it had acquired Smithery and that co-founder Anirudh Kamath was joining Arcade. On October 27, 2026 the smithery.ai homepage still offered to browse 27,365+ MCPs. For the head to head as it stood before the change, see our Glama vs Smithery comparison.

How to pick a replacement

Start with the job, not the brand. Smithery did four things for different people, and no single product replaces all four. Connecting to servers someone else hosts: you need the vendor's own URL, or a gateway that sits in front of it. Managing MCP connections for your own users: you need a platform that runs per-user OAuth, stores tokens and logs calls, which is what Smithery Connect did. Hosting a server you wrote: you need somewhere that builds and runs it on a stable URL. Finding servers: you need a directory or registry. Within each job we weighted four things: whether the product handles OAuth instead of asking you to paste secrets, whether its price is public, whether you can leave without changing every client config, and whether its docs explain how servers are built, isolated or verified. The general checks in our guide on how to choose an MCP server apply here too.

Moving your hosted Smithery servers

If you connected Claude, Cursor or another client to a server through a run.tools or server.smithery.ai address, that address stops working on October 31, 2026. Smithery's instruction is short: switch to the vendor's official MCP URL, which you can find on the server's page on smithery.ai. Work through it in three steps. First, list every client config that contains a Smithery URL, including team machines and any agent code. Second, look up each server on smithery.ai and copy the direct vendor URL. Third, reconnect and sign in to each server again: Smithery's notice says its managed identity and accounts shut down with the proxy, so plan on fresh sign-ins. If a server has no official remote URL, you have two choices: run it locally, for example in the Docker MCP Toolkit, or host it yourself on Prefect Horizon or Cloudflare Workers. If your client cannot connect to a remote URL directly, our mcp-remote alternatives page covers the bridges, and our remote MCP server guide explains how hosted servers and their auth work.

Replacing the Smithery CLI and SDKs

A deprecated CLI is a dead end even while it still runs, and anything that called the Smithery API or relied on Smithery accounts stops on October 31 regardless. For local servers, the closest replacement is Docker's open source MCP gateway, the docker mcp CLI plugin behind the Docker MCP Toolkit. It is MIT licensed, works inside Docker Desktop or on its own, groups servers into profiles, and can pull servers from the Docker catalog, any OCI image or the official MCP Registry. For building and shipping your own server, the FastMCP framework plus Prefect Horizon, or Cloudflare's remote MCP templates replace the build and deploy role. For code that discovered servers through the Smithery API, the official MCP Registry's REST API is the vendor-neutral source, though it is still in preview.

If you built on Smithery Connect

The hardest migration is for teams that used Smithery to manage MCP connections for their own end users, because that means per-user OAuth, token storage and refresh. Smithery's notice says these teams need a replacement before October 31 and offers help choosing one, even if it is not Arcade. Arcade, which now owns Smithery, lets you register any remote MCP server in its dashboard, put it behind an Arcade MCP gateway, choose which tools to expose, and have every end user authenticate individually, with each action tied to that person's identity. Composio's MCP Gateway gives each team its own endpoint carrying only permitted tools, centralizes OAuth connections and token refresh so credentials never reach the agent, and accepts your own MCP servers alongside its 1,500+ managed toolkits. Both have free tiers, so you can run a small pilot before the deadline.

Costs after the move

Prices are as of October 2026. Switching to a vendor's official URL costs nothing beyond the vendor's own plan. For managed connections, the two free tiers differ a lot in size: Composio's Hobby plan includes 100,000 tool calls a month and pauses at the cap instead of billing you, while Arcade's Free plan includes 2,000 tool calls and 2,000 auth events a month. Paid usage also differs: Composio Pro is $29 a month with a $29 usage credit, and tool calls past 100,000 a month bill at $0.0003 each on your own app ($0.0005 on Composio-managed apps after 20,000), and Arcade Team is $25 a month plus $0.01 per tool call and $0.10 per auth event. For hosting, Prefect Horizon has a free personal tier and Cloudflare Workers Free allows 100,000 requests a day, with Paid from $5 a month. Zapier MCP spends two tasks per tool call, so its Free plan's 100 tasks cover about 50 calls. The Docker Toolkit lists no fee, but Docker Desktop is paid for companies with 250 or more employees or $10 million or more in revenue.

Lock-in and how to avoid the next migration

Smithery's shutdown shows where lock-in sits: in URLs and stored credentials. Every client config needs editing, and every user signs in again. The cheapest protection is to point clients at the vendor's own URL wherever one exists, because that address does not depend on any middleman. When you do need a gateway, prefer one you can move. Docker's gateway is open source and runs on your own machine, Cloudflare and Prefect Horizon host servers built from your own repository, Composio lists VPC and fully self-hosted deployment for its gateway, and Arcade's Enterprise plan lists VPC or air-gapped deployment. For discovery, build against the official MCP Registry's OpenAPI spec, which other registries can implement, rather than one directory's private API. If you are weighing Glama as the next home instead, read our Glama alternatives page first.

How we chose

We matched each job Smithery did to products that document a replacement for it. For every pick we read the official site, documentation, pricing page or GitHub README on October 27, 2026, and recorded a source for each claim. We compared official information only and did not test, install or benchmark any product. Cards on this page are limited to products that have a listing on this site. Arcade has no listing here, so it appears in the table and text but not as a card. Glama and mcp.so are left out because they do not have indexable listings on this site; Glama's hosting is billed by machine hours and egress with rates shown only inside the workspace.

What we could not verify

Smithery's notice does not say what happens to servers that were only ever available through its proxy and have no vendor URL, so check each one before October 31. Prefect Horizon's docs mention a free personal tier for FastMCP users but give no team or enterprise prices. Composio's pricing page does not repeat the VPC and self-hosted options its gateway page lists, and Zapier's MCP page gives two different action counts, so we quote only its 9,000+ app figure.

The Verdict

Most Smithery users need no new product at all: replace each run.tools or server.smithery.ai URL with the vendor's official MCP URL, sign in again, and keep using smithery.ai as a free directory to find those URLs. Do it before October 31, 2026.

If you managed connections for a team or your product's users, Composio is the strongest documented replacement, with per-team endpoints, managed OAuth and a $0 Hobby plan as of October 2026; Arcade, Smithery's new owner, is the natural second look with per-user auth for remote servers. If you hosted your own server on Smithery, redeploy it on Prefect Horizon if it is a FastMCP server, or on Cloudflare Workers for anything else. For local servers, the Docker MCP Toolkit replaces the Smithery CLI with signed, isolated containers. Then use our list of the best MCP servers to choose what to connect next.

Sources

• The future of Smithery (shutdown notice)
• Smithery homepage
• Smithery Is Now Part of Arcade.dev
• Arcade: bring third-party MCP servers
• Arcade pricing
• Composio MCP Gateway
• Composio pricing
• Docker MCP Catalog documentation
• Docker MCP Toolkit documentation
• Docker MCP gateway repository
• Docker Desktop license terms
• Prefect Horizon deployment (FastMCP docs)
• Cloudflare: MCP on Cloudflare
• Cloudflare: build a remote MCP server
• Cloudflare Workers pricing
• Zapier MCP
• Zapier pricing
• MCP Registry documentation
• MCP reference servers repository
• Glama MCP hosting
• mcp.so