MainWP AI

MainWP AI lets you manage the WordPress sites in your MainWP Dashboard from an AI assistant such as Claude, Cursor, VS Code Copilot or OpenAI Codex. Ask which sites need updates, which client a site belongs to or when a site was last backed up, and the assistant answers from your Dashboard’s own data.

The AI menu, Knowledge and over 100 Dashboard abilities are part of the free MainWP Core, and MainWP MCP is a free, open-source tool that connects your assistant to them. It’s built for agencies, freelancers and developers who already work with an AI assistant and look after many WordPress sites.

Over 20,000 MainWP Dashboards manage over 700,000 child sites, and MainWP has over 2,200 five-star reviews on WordPress.org.

Answering a question about your sites usually means opening your MainWP Dashboard, clicking through Sites, Updates and Clients, and turning what you find into a run by hand. MainWP AI lets you ask in plain words and approve the result.

What does MainWP AI include?

MainWP AI is a set of tools built on the abilities in your MainWP Dashboard, so your assistant, your scripts and your Dashboard work from the same data.

How do you connect Claude, Cursor or Codex to your MainWP Dashboard?

Open AI > MainWP MCP in your MainWP Dashboard. The guided setup creates an Application Password, gives you the configuration for your AI tool, and suggests a first prompt to test the connection: “List all my sites”.

• Claude Code: add the MainWP plugin with /plugin marketplace add mainwp/mainwp-mcp and /plugin install mainwp@mainwp-mcp.
• Claude Desktop: install the MainWP MCP bundle, which stores your Application Password in your system keychain.
• Cursor, VS Code Copilot, OpenAI Codex and other MCP tools: add the configuration from the setup page, with a guide for each tool in the MainWP MCP client docs.
• Several Dashboards: add one MainWP MCP entry for each MainWP Dashboard you run.

What can your AI assistant do in your MainWP Dashboard?

Your MainWP Dashboard registers over 100 abilities with the WordPress Abilities API, and MainWP MCP turns each one into a tool your assistant can call.

• Sites: list, sync, check, add, reconnect or remove child sites.
• Updates: review and apply core, plugin, theme and translation updates.
• Plugins and themes: inspect, activate, deactivate, update or delete them.
• Clients and tags: organize clients, sites and tags, and read each client’s costs.
• Backups: run backups, check their status and history, and manage backup tasks with over 30 Built-In Backups abilities.
• Add-ons: work with Team Control, Cache Control, Google Search Console, SSL Monitor and the other add-ons that register abilities.

How does MainWP keep you in charge of what your AI assistant changes?

MainWP MCP previews every update and deletion before it runs. Your assistant shows you the sites and items the change covers, and the change runs after you confirm.

• Previews from the start: confirmation is on by default. The preview is a dry run, and your confirmation applies to that exact change for five minutes.
• Your update rules: updates you’ve ignored and sites you’ve excluded stay as they are.
• Backups first: with the pre-update backup in MainWP Built-In Backups turned on, update runs cover the sites that have a recent backup.
• Safe mode: block destructive tools completely while you get comfortable.
• Tool lists: choose which tools your assistant sees, for example a read-only list for reports.
• Team rights: with MainWP Team Control, part of MainWP Pro, each team member’s rights apply to the abilities too.

How does MainWP Knowledge brief your AI assistant on each client?

MainWP Knowledge saves what your assistant should know about your agency, each client and each site in your MainWP Dashboard, so you brief it once instead of in every conversation. Open AI > Knowledge to add and review records.

• Three levels: Agency records apply to every site, Client records to that client’s sites, and Site records to one site.
• Three types: Context for facts and preferences, Skills for procedures you repeat, and Memory for the results of earlier work.
• Required rules: mark agency or client context and skills as Required, and they take precedence over a more specific site rule.
• Review: records your assistant adds arrive as Unverified on the Review tab, where you verify, edit or delete them.

How does your AI assistant use MainWP Knowledge when it plans a client’s work?

MainWP MCP tells your assistant to load a site’s Knowledge before it advises on the site or plans work, and that includes the client’s and your agency’s records. Ask it to plan this week’s updates for a client’s site, and the plan follows the rules you saved.

Can your scripts use the same MainWP abilities?

Yes. The abilities your assistant uses are open to your own scripts and tools as well.

• MainWP Control: a free, open-source command-line tool. mainwpcontrol abilities list shows every ability, and mainwpcontrol abilities run list-sites-v1 --json runs one, with dry runs, explicit confirmation and a local audit log. See MainWP Control.
• Abilities REST endpoint: run any ability through the WordPress REST API under /wp-json/wp-abilities/v1 with an Application Password.
• MainWP REST API: version 2 covers sites, clients, tags, updates, monitors, users, posts and pages with MainWP API keys.
• WP-CLI: wp mainwp commands list sites, sync them, run updates and work with backups.

Is MainWP AI right for your agency?

MainWP AI suits you if you already use an AI assistant for your work and manage your client sites from your MainWP Dashboard.

How do you set up MainWP AI?

1. Update your MainWP Dashboard to 6.3 or later, on WordPress 6.9 or later.
2. Open AI > MainWP MCP.
3. In Credentials, create an Application Password.
4. In Connect, copy the configuration into your AI tool.
5. In Test, ask your assistant “List all my sites”.
6. Open AI > Knowledge and add your agency’s context and skills.

The MainWP MCP quickstart and the Knowledge guide cover each step.

MainWP AI FAQ