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MCP Gateway Overview

The MCP Gateway lets you bring tools from external MCP servers into your Nexla ToolSets. This creates a unified catalog of tools from both your Nexla data (Nexsets) and third-party MCP servers, so AI agents connected to your MCP server can use tools from all sources seamlessly.

What Is the MCP Gateway?​

Most organizations rely on tools and services spread across multiple platforms. The MCP Gateway bridges this gap by letting you register external MCP servers -- from third-party providers or your own internal services -- and import their tools directly into Nexla. Once imported, these external tools sit alongside your Nexla-generated tools in a single ToolSet, and AI agents can discover and invoke them without any additional configuration.

This means you can combine data tools backed by your Nexsets with specialized tools from other MCP-compatible services, all managed and governed from within the Nexla Platform.

How It Works​

The Gateway workflow follows four steps:

  1. Register an external MCP server by providing its URL and credentials. Nexla stores the connection details securely and establishes a link to the server.
  2. Sync -- Nexla connects to the external server, discovers its available tools, and imports them into your ToolSet as gateway tools.
  3. Filter -- Optionally set include/exclude patterns to control which tools are imported. Use glob syntax to match tool names (e.g., data_* to include only tools starting with "data_").
  4. Use -- Gateway tools appear alongside your Nexla tools in the ToolSet and are available to AI agents through your deployed MCP Server.

Key Features​

Unified Tool Catalog​

Combine tools generated from Nexla Nexsets and tools imported from external MCP servers in a single ToolSet. AI agents see one unified list of tools and can invoke any of them through the same MCP Server connection. There is no distinction from the agent's perspective -- all tools are discovered and called the same way.

Automatic Sync​

The Gateway periodically syncs with registered external servers to keep the tool catalog up to date. When tools are added, updated, or removed on the external server, the next sync reflects those changes in your ToolSet. You can also trigger a manual sync at any time from the Gateway dashboard.

Tool Filtering​

Control exactly which tools are imported from an external server using include and exclude patterns. Patterns use glob syntax -- * matches any sequence of characters and ? matches a single character. For example, sales_* imports only tools whose names start with "sales_", while excluding internal_* prevents internal tools from being imported. You can preview filtered results before applying changes.

Search across all gateway tools using natural language descriptions. The Gateway generates AI-powered embeddings for every tool, enabling intelligent, fuzzy matching. This is especially useful when working with large catalogs of tools where exact name matching is impractical -- describe what you need in plain language and the search surfaces the most relevant tools.

Prerequisites​

Before using the MCP Gateway, make sure you have the following:

  • An active ToolSet with MCP Gateway enabled. See Create & Manage ToolSets for instructions on setting up a ToolSet.
  • The external MCP server's URL and any required authentication credentials (API key, OAuth token, etc.).
  • The external server must support the Streamable HTTP transport type.

Next Steps​

  • Register External MCP Servers -- Step-by-step instructions for registering an external server, syncing tools, and configuring filters.
  • Gateway API -- Programmatically manage external server registrations, syncs, and gateway tools via the REST API.