Using Figma's MCP server

[jacksonrayhamilton]

Issue

Hi, I am having trouble enabling Figma's MCP server and was hoping for help / debugging tips.

Figma instructs to the configure the server like so:

Sidenote - is "SSE" supported? Figma's instructions for configuring VS Code suggest "type": "http"...

...so I assumed that's the same as "transport": "http". I created .aider.conf.yml in my repo with the following contents:

mcp-servers: |
  {
    "mcpServers": {
      "Figma": {
        "transport": "http",
        "url": "https://mcp.figma.com/mcp"
      }
    }
  }

When I start Aider I get the following output:

% aider          
fzf not found, fuzzy finder features will be disabled. Install it for enhanced file/history search.
─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────
Using sonnet model with API key from environment.
ERROR:root:Error during cleanup of server Figma: unhandled errors in a TaskGroup (1 sub-exception)
ERROR:root:Error during cleanup of server Figma: unhandled errors in a TaskGroup (1 sub-exception)
ERROR:root:Error during cleanup of server Figma: unhandled errors in a TaskGroup (1 sub-exception)
MCP tool initialization failed after multiple retries due to cancellation.
Aider v0.87.13
Main model: anthropic/claude-sonnet-4-20250514 with diff edit format, infinite output
Weak model: anthropic/claude-3-5-haiku-20241022
Git repo: .git with 1,035 files
Warning: For large repos, consider using --subtree-only and .aiderignore
See: https://aider.chat/docs/faq.html#can-i-use-aider-in-a-large-mono-repo
Repo-map: using 4096 tokens, auto refresh
─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────
>  

aider --verbose seems to indicate that it's trying to start the server, at least:

% aider --verbose
...
Config File (/path/to/my/repo/.aider.conf.yml):
  mcp-servers:       {
  "mcpServers": {
    "Figma": {
      "transport": "http",
      "url": "https://mcp.figma.com/mcp"
    }
  }
}
...
Loading MCP servers from provided JSON string
Loading MCP server: Figma
Loaded 1 MCP servers from JSON string
RepoMap initialized with map_mul_no_files: 2
RepoMap initialized with map_cache_dir: .
RepoMap assumes repo root is: /path/to/my/repo
ERROR:root:Error during cleanup of server Figma: unhandled errors in a TaskGroup (1 sub-exception)
ERROR:root:Error during cleanup of server Figma: unhandled errors in a TaskGroup (1 sub-exception)
ERROR:root:Error during cleanup of server Figma: unhandled errors in a TaskGroup (1 sub-exception)
MCP tool initialization failed after multiple retries due to cancellation.

I've looked through conversations on GitHub about the MCP server integration and haven't seen anyone encounter a similar issue. Maybe I am just missing the mark here. Appreciate your support!

Version and model info

Aider v0.87.13
Main model: anthropic/claude-sonnet-4-20250514 with diff edit format, infinite output
Weak model: anthropic/claude-3-5-haiku-20241022
Git repo: .git with 1,035 files
Repo-map: using 4096 tokens, auto refresh

[jacksonrayhamilton]

I suspect it has something to do with authentication. I tried enabling the MCP server with Claude Code and Claude Code indicated that I needed to authenticate before I could use the server. I had to authenticate through my browser before I could use it.

[dwash96]

It definitely has something to do with authentication. I've managed to get the actual httpx error:

    | Traceback (most recent call last):
    |   File "/home/dwash/aider/venv/lib64/python3.12/site-packages/mcp/client/streamable_http.py", line 407, in handle_request_async
    |     await self._handle_post_request(ctx)
    |   File "/home/dwash/aider/venv/lib64/python3.12/site-packages/mcp/client/streamable_http.py", line 278, in _handle_post_request
    |     response.raise_for_status()
    |   File "/home/dwash/aider/venv/lib64/python3.12/site-packages/httpx/_models.py", line 829, in raise_for_status
    |     raise HTTPStatusError(message, request=request, response=self)
    | httpx.HTTPStatusError: Client error '401 Unauthorized' for url 'https://mcp.figma.com/mcp'
    | For more information check: https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/HTTP/Status/401

I added the SSE transport explicitly and also the ability to forward headers to the http transport on the coroutine-experiment branch (soon to be main). I can't entirely confirm this on my own but if Figma has implemented a largely standards compliant MCP server, then a configuration like:

{
  "mcpServers":{
   "figma": {
      "transport": "http", 
      "url": "https://mcp.figma.com/mcp"
       "headers": {
           "Authorization": "Bearer <Figma Personal Access Token>"
       }
    }
  }
}

Might get you over this hurdle. There's also:
https://github.com/GLips/Figma-Context-MCP

As an open source alternative to the official server but that might not suit your needs

[jacksonrayhamilton]

Thanks for getting back to me! Apologies I haven't taken the time to test this yet. Busy but will have to make time soon.

[jacksonrayhamilton]

Using Aider v0.88.9, I tried your suggestion, but I still got the same error: MCP tool initialization failed after multiple retries due to cancellation.

Perhaps the personal access token is only meant for API access, but not their MCP server? Looking at their UI, it seems like Figma classifies the type of connections with access to their MCP server as "Connected Apps," and that's a separate category from [API] access tokens.

Screenshot from their UI:

I think apps like Claude Code use OAuth to connect to Figma's remote MCP server.

In any case, I realized that Figma also offers a local MCP server via their desktop app. I figured this would take care of authentication for me. I installed their app, logged in within the app, enabled the MCP server according to the instructions, and used the following .aider.conf.yml configuration:

mcp-servers: |
  {
    "mcpServers": {
      "figma-desktop": {
        "transport": "http", 
        "url": "http://127.0.0.1:3845/mcp"
      }
    }
  }

Now Aider is able to use my local MCP server!