Agentic tools. Enterprise governance.
Universal Model Context Protocol (MCP) gateway for autonomous AI agents. Proxy enterprise MCP servers via /mcp and /mcp/{server_id} with strict credential sanitization, zero header leaks, sub-millisecond dispatch, and end-to-end request-ID audit tracing.
Agent Tool Orchestration
- Tool execution dispatch
- < 1 ms
- Protocol standard
- MCP 1.0
- Credential leakage risk
- Zero
- Model compatibility
- 434+
High-speed asynchronous Rust proxy
Universal JSON-RPC context protocol
Strict header sanitization & upstream token injection
Automatic schema and format translation
Secure tool proxying for autonomous agent workflows
Agents dispatch tool requests via standard MCP endpoints. nRouter validates authorization, injects enterprise secrets securely, executes the tool, and streams telemetry back to your observability pipeline.
Model Context Protocol Execution Lifecycle
Agent Instruction
Tool Call Request
Autonomous agent initiates an MCP tool call (database query, API fetch, or document index).
MCP Gateway Proxy
Protocol Validation
nRouter validates JSON-RPC schema, verifies virtual key permissions, and checks tool authorization.
Credential Hygiene
Zero Header Leaks
Strict header allowlists strip sensitive client Authorization tokens while attaching tool credentials.
Sandboxed Execution
Telemetry & Settle
Tool call is logged with execution latency, payload size, and return code under the parent x-nr-request-id.
Decouple tools from models with centralized governance
Tool Security
Eliminate credential leaks and uncontrolled agent tool loops
Autonomous agent loops require access to external databases, microservices, and internal APIs. nRouter MCP Gateway proxies all tool calls through /mcp and /mcp/{server_id}, stripping sensitive authentication headers and preventing credential exfiltration. See our security posture and press announcements on enterprise agent safety.
- Zero header leaks: client Authorization and virtual-key secrets stripped before tool proxying
- Server-side credential injection attaches tool-specific secrets securely inside the proxy
- Strict parameter schema validation blocks malformed SQL queries or command injection
- Timeout circuit breakers abort runaway agent loops before database starvation
- Unified tracing links every tool execution directly to the parent x-nr-request-id
Connected Enterprise MCP Tools
Full MCP gateway technical specification — schemas, security & transport
- Standardized Model Context Protocol (MCP)
- Native support for the open standard for AI tools and context servers. Connect your AI agents to Postgres, GitHub, Slack, filesystem, and custom internal APIs without custom glue code.
- Zero header leaks & credential isolation
- Agents never receive or leak raw database passwords, internal API tokens, or secrets. nRouter MCP Gateway enforces strict header allowlists, strips client virtual keys, and injects authentication tokens server-side.
- Cross-model protocol translation
- Seamlessly translate tool calls between OpenAI function calling format, Anthropic tool use schemas, and native MCP JSON-RPC, allowing you to swap model backends without rewriting agent tools.
- Tool call observability
- Every tool invocation is tracked with execution latency, payload size, return code, and error messages, bound directly to the parent LLM request via unified x-nr-request-id.
- Fine-grained tool permissions per virtual key
- Restrict which tools an agent or user can invoke. Define read-only vs mutating tool scopes, disallow dangerous shell execution, and enforce approval gates on sensitive actions.
- High-concurrency Rust proxy core
- Built inside the nRouter high-performance Rust proxy engine. Dispatches thousands of concurrent tool calls with negligible latency overhead (<1ms proxy routing).
Frequently asked questions about the MCP gateway
What is the Model Context Protocol (MCP)?
Model Context Protocol (MCP) is an open industry standard that enables AI models and autonomous agents to securely connect to external tools, databases, repositories, and context sources with a standardized protocol.
How does nRouter prevent header leaks during MCP tool proxying?
The Rust gateway enforces a strict HTTP header allowlist on all MCP proxy routes (/mcp and /mcp/{server_id}). Client authorization tokens (such as sk-nrouter-* keys) and sensitive request headers are scrubbed before reaching the MCP tool server. Upstream tool credentials stored in enterprise key vaults are injected server-side. Tool response headers are similarly filtered to ensure no downstream server secrets are leaked back to the client agent.
Can I use MCP with models that do not natively support it?
Yes. The nRouter Gateway automatically bridges and translates standard OpenAI tool-calling and Anthropic tool-use formats into standardized MCP JSON-RPC messages, enabling tool usage across the live model catalog.
Which agent frameworks are supported?
nRouter MCP Gateway works out of the box with LangChain, LlamaIndex, CrewAI, AutoGen, Microsoft Semantic Kernel, and native Python / TypeScript MCP client libraries.
Does tool execution incur token charges?
Tool execution through the MCP Gateway does not incur additional per-token markup. You only pay for standard LLM inference tokens consumed by the model before and after the tool invocation.
Where can I host my MCP servers?
You can host MCP servers in your own private VPC (AWS, Azure, GCP), behind Cloudflare Tunnels, or connect to publicly available enterprise MCP servers via mTLS and Bearer authentication.
Empower Your Agents
Supercharge autonomous AI agents with the MCP Gateway
Connect your AI agents to enterprise data and tools with standardized security, credential isolation, and comprehensive observability.