Support repository-level Copilot CLI MCP configuration

[pmb5]

Describe the feature or problem you'd like to solve

Currently, MCP servers for the CLI can only be configured globally via ~/.copilot/mcp-config.json, VSCode can be per folder/project

Proposed solution

Currently, MCP servers can only be configured globally via ~/.copilot/mcp-config.json.

Feature Request:
Enable repository-level MCP server configuration, similar to LSP servers. This would allow teams to:

• Share project-specific MCP servers via version control
• Automatically enable relevant MCP tools when working in specific directories
• Keep global config clean by only loading servers when needed

Proposed Implementation:

// .github/mcp.json
{
    'servers': {
        'ProjectSpecificServer': {
            'type': 'stdio',
            'command': 'dotnet',
            'args': ['run', '--project', '../mcp-servers/project-mcp/project-mcp.csproj'],
            'env': { 'CONNECTION_STRING': '...' }
        }
    }
}

This would work exactly like the .vscode folder where we can have custom MCP server for each project/folder

Example prompts or workflows

No response

Additional context

No response

[kawax]

My recommendation

• .github/mcp-config.json Consistent within Copilot
• .mcp.json Claude compatible

[alexg-c4]

We already have .vscode/mcp.json in our projects, would be nice if CLI could read this as well.

[mrclrchtr]

https://github.com/github/copilot-cli/releases/tag/v0.0.401

added .mcp.json support

[examon]

This should be resolved as of v0.0.401, which added support for repository-level MCP configuration via .mcp.json at the workspace root. The CLI also reads .vscode/mcp.json and .devcontainer/devcontainer.json, and as of v1.0.11 it discovers these configs from the working directory up to the git root, which covers monorepo setups as well. The specific .github/mcp.json path proposed here is not used as a workspace config source, but .mcp.json provides the same repo-scoped, version-controlled behavior. If you believe there is still a gap, please feel free to reopen this issue.