Apps & Agents
Connect an AI agent or an app to Cypress. The MCP servers, a sandbox to start in, what an agent may and may not do, keys and tokens, and every action of the app.
TL;DRAI summary
This chapter explains how you can connect other software, like AI agents or your own systems, to Cypress. These connections run under the same rules as the main app, so you stay in control of your fleet.
Cypress can be worked by software as well as people: an AI agent that speaks the Model Context Protocol (MCP), a partner's app your organization connects, or your own systems. Whatever the door, the rules are the app's. Every call runs the same code as the button on the app's screen, with the same checks, the same floor and the same privacy. A decision that belongs to a person is never made by software: it comes back with a link for a person to act on.
MCP quickstart
Ten minutes: connect an agent to a sandbox, list the fleet, put a car on the market with a dry run first.
What an agent can and cannot do
Area by area, the decisions that stay with a person, and how a refusal comes back.
Keys and tokens
API keys, sandbox keys, Connect Cypress tokens and CM tokens: who each one acts as.
MCP servers
Operate, Intelligence and the Manual: every tool by area, and how to show an agent only what its job needs.
How it fits together
Three ways in
| Way in | For | Start with |
|---|---|---|
| MCP servers | An AI agent. Cypress Operate works in your organization, Cypress Intelligence reads what Cypress knows, Cypress Manual reads these docs (no key needed) | MCP quickstart, then MCP servers |
| REST API | Your own systems and partners' apps, under /api/v1 | Developer quickstart |
| Webhooks | Hearing what changed, whoever changed it: a person in the app, an agent, an automation, an import | Webhooks, and Events and sync to keep a copy in step |
The MCP tools and the REST operations are the same actions: each MCP tool runs one REST operation, through the same code. Everything a person does on the app's screens is one of them, listed in The app's actions.
Before you go live
- Build in a sandbox. A Cypress Manager makes you one, with a test key that can't reach a real person. See Sandbox.
- Choose the credential. An API key for your own systems and agents, Connect Cypress for an app many organizations use or an agent platform. See Keys and tokens.
- Give it the least it needs. Scopes decide what it may do; toolsets decide which tools an agent is shown. By default an agent sees the core tools, thirteen of them.
- Dry run what you can't take back. Every write takes
dryRun, andidempotencyKeymakes a retry safe. - Measure it. Run the evaluation tasks in a sandbox before it works in your live organization.
In this section
| Page | What it covers |
|---|---|
| MCP quickstart | A sandbox, a client, and an agent's first ten minutes in Cypress |
| What an agent can and cannot do | The agent role, area by area, and how a refusal comes back |
| Keys and tokens | Every credential, who it acts as, scopes and toolsets |
| MCP servers | The three servers, every tool by area, the protocol, switching a server off |
| Core tools | Thirteen tools for an agent's everyday work, and every other operation through discovery |
| Domain model | The records, their ids, links and states, what changes them and what they announce |
| Events and sync | Keeping a copy of your records in step: backfill, every change, reconcile |
| Connecting from | Claude, ChatGPT, Cursor, Copilot Studio, Agentforce, Palantir: which door and which credential |
| Evaluations | Tasks to measure an agent in a sandbox, each with a good run, what it must never do, and the check |
| Sandbox | What a sandbox holds, how it behaves, starting over |
| Connect Cypress | OAuth for apps: the consent screen, tokens for a person or an agent, Sign in with Cypress |
| The app's actions | Every button of the app as a REST operation and an MCP tool, with the webhook it sends |
For your team rather than your developers, the platform manual explains the same thing in the app's terms: Apps, agents and MCP and Connect an app or an agent.