Support MCP Apps Standard

[MarcSkovMadsen]

MCP servers is becoming the integration layer between AI and Applications. With the release of the MCP Apps standard the MCP Servers can now return interactive UI components.

For HoloViz developers this means two things:

1. that Panel and Lumen AI Developers would like to be able to consume AI UI elements inside their Panel and Lumen AI applications.
2. that HoloViz MCP developers would like to be able to create AI UI elements using the HoloViz ecosystem to display plots, interactive tools or dashboards inside claude, copilot and custom ai applications.

When the standard is mature enough, then please support

1. Consumption of AI UI elements in Panel and Lumen AI apps. Probably via a dedicated Pane and documentation.
2. Serving HoloViz components as AI UI elements to AI Apps. Probably via best practice example documentation.

• Example code (typescript) for rendering AI UI elements can be found here.

[MarcSkovMadsen]

Triage: panel #8396 — Support MCP Apps Standard

Type: Feature | Labels: type: feature

Summary

Feature request to integrate Panel with the MCP Apps standard (released January 26, 2026), which extends the Model Context Protocol to allow MCP servers to serve interactive UI elements inside AI chatbots. The request covers two directions: consuming MCP Apps UI elements inside Panel/Lumen AI apps (via a dedicated Pane), and serving HoloViz components as MCP Apps UI elements to AI clients.

Next Steps

• Wait for MCP Apps standard to mature before investing significant development effort (released only weeks ago)
• Consider a proof-of-concept using Panel's existing pn.pane.HTML and iframe capabilities
• Decide whether to prioritize consumption (Pane for rendering MCP Apps) or serving (exporting Panel as MCP Apps)
• Coordinate with Lumen AI if MCP Apps support should span both projects
• Monitor the ext-apps repo for breaking changes to the specification before starting implementation

Details

Issue: panel#8396
Author: @MarcSkovMadsen | Created: 2026-01-28 | State: open

Duplicate / Related Issues

No duplicates found. The only prior MCP-related Panel content is a Discourse showcase demonstrating the existing HoloViz MCP server (for AI-assisted development), which is a different use case.

Documentation Search

• No existing MCP Apps-related code, modules, or documentation in the Panel codebase.
• Panel's pn.pane.HTML already supports rendering arbitrary HTML content, which aligns with MCP Apps' approach of serving text/html;profile=mcp-app content in sandboxed iframes.
• Panel's ability to export components as standalone HTML (save(), embed()) provides a foundation for serving Panel components as MCP Apps.

About MCP Apps

The MCP Apps specification (first official MCP extension) was introduced in the MCP specification. Key aspects:

• Uses ui:// URI scheme for declaring UI resources
• Serves HTML content (text/html;profile=mcp-app) rendered in sandboxed iframes
• Supports bidirectional communication between UI and host via JSON-RPC
• Includes security layers: iframe sandboxing, content review before rendering

References:

• MCP Apps GitHub repo
• MCP Apps Blog Post
• MCP Apps Specification
• SEP-1865 Pull Request

Root Cause

Not applicable — this is a feature request for new functionality.

Potential Solution

Two implementation paths:

1. Consuming MCP Apps: Create a pn.pane.MCPApp or similar component that can render MCP Apps UI elements (HTML served via ui:// URI scheme) inside Panel applications.

2. Serving Panel as MCP Apps: Create documentation and possibly helper utilities for exporting Panel components as MCP Apps-compatible HTML. Panel already supports save() and embed() for standalone HTML.

The standard was released only weeks ago (January 26, 2026), so waiting for it to stabilize before investing significant development effort is reasonable.

Reproduction

Test file: .triaging/triage_panel_8396_20260218_164224_f17ded09-f222-4fe2-a9a1-7562e078cd7b_test.py

Run tests:

python -m pytest .triaging/triage_panel_8396_20260218_164224_f17ded09-f222-4fe2-a9a1-7562e078cd7b_test.py -v

Pytest result: 3 passed in 2.66s
Reproduces on main: N/A (feature request, not a bug)

All tests pass, confirming no MCP Apps support exists and that Panel's existing HTML rendering foundation is functional.

"""Reproduction tests for panel#8396.

Feature request: Support MCP Apps Standard for consuming and serving
AI UI elements in Panel apps. These tests document the current state
of Panel -- confirming no MCP Apps support exists yet, and verifying
that Panel's existing HTML rendering capabilities (the likely foundation
for MCP Apps integration) work correctly.
"""
import panel as pn


def test_panel_has_no_mcp_apps_module():
    """Panel does not yet have an MCP Apps module or component."""
    assert not hasattr(pn, "mcp")
    assert not hasattr(pn.pane, "MCPApp")


def test_html_pane_renders_sandboxed_iframe_content():
    """Panel's HTML pane can render HTML content -- foundation for MCP Apps."""
    html_content = "<div>Hello from MCP App</div>"
    html_pane = pn.pane.HTML(html_content)
    assert html_pane.object == html_content


def test_panel_servable_exports_html():
    """Panel components can produce Bokeh models for HTML export."""
    widget = pn.widgets.Button(name="Click me")
    model = widget.get_root()
    assert model is not None

[AtharvaJaiswal005]

Hi, this is very exciting. I have experience building MCP tooling - I recently contributed MCP type resolution fixes to LlamaIndex (run-llama/llama_index#20780) and I am familiar with FastMCP and the MCP specification.

I am planning to apply for the GSoC 2026 HoloViz MCP Integration project and would love to contribute to this effort. The GSoC project focuses on the "serving" side - exposing Panel/HoloViews visualizations as MCP tools that AI agents can create and manipulate.

I have started contributing to Panel (#6357, #3203) and am happy to help with a proof-of-concept once the MCP Apps standard stabilizes. Would be great to coordinate with the mentors on this.