Install IMG.LY CoDesign in any MCP client

Check your client runs local servers

CoDesign runs on your own machine and talks over stdio. A client that only connects to remote MCP servers over HTTP cannot start it, and no amount of config will change that.

Get Node 22 or newer

Run this in a terminal.

node --version

If it prints nothing, or a version below v22, install Node with the line that matches your machine, then open a new terminal so the updated PATH takes effect. With no package manager to hand, the installer at nodejs.org does the same job.

brew install node

winget install OpenJS.NodeJS.LTS

nvm install --lts && nvm use --lts

Register the server

If your client has a command for adding an MCP server, give it the command npx and the arguments below. If it reads a JSON config file instead, merge this block in, keeping any servers already under mcpServers. Keep @latest so npx re-resolves the package instead of reusing a stale cached copy, and keep stdio, which selects the transport.

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "codesign": {
      "command": "npx",
      "args": ["-y", "@imgly/codesign-mcp@latest", "stdio"]
    }
  }
}

npx -y @imgly/codesign-mcp@latest stdio

Restart the client, then start the onboarding

A newly registered stdio server is not live in the session that registered it, so restart your client first. Then send the message below. It runs a short guided flow that explains what CoDesign does and produces one finished design. No account is needed. Signing in to a free IMG.LY account is optional and only adds AI image generation.

start the CoDesign onboarding