The full upstream README, mirrored here for reference. Install config, tool schemas, adoption signals, and an original overview live on the Codesign listing page.
The design layer for the agent era.
CoDesign gives your coding agent a real design engine. Generate, edit, and automate fully editable designs — print, social, and video — straight from the chat, then export print-ready PDFs, images, and more. You steer, the agent edits the same scene, and you keep control of the outcome.
It ships as an MCP server (plus a Claude Code plugin) that hands your agent
IMG.LY's CE.SDK CreativeEngine — the same production engine behind IMG.LY's
commercial SDKs. Every recipe below spawns the published npm package
@imgly/codesign-mcp over stdio; no separate install step — npx fetches it on first
use.
Ask your agent, in plain language:
Three layers, one product:
@imgly/codesign-mcp) — exposes the design tools (edit,
preview, export, list, history, …) over MCP, driven by tool calls
from any agent host.This repository — the Claude Code and Codex plugins, marketplace manifests,
skills and documentation — is released under the MIT License.
The CoDesign engine itself, distributed as the npm package @imgly/codesign-mcp, is
proprietary software from IMG.LY and free to use locally. The full terms ship
inside the package as LICENSE.md.
Every other design agent draws on a web canvas — a quick fix that breaks on the hard problems. CoDesign commands a production engine matured over years across print, video, and social:
Read this first — the failure modes below are silent.
PATH, the host reports the
server as failed with no useful reason — typically local: 0 and
MCP error -32000. Install Node 22.15+ first: https://nodejs.org.@latest — it's in every recipe on purpose. A bare, unpinned npx
caches the package and goes stale; because each release carries a rolling
30-day trial license, a stale copy eventually stops working.npx. Hosts that spawn npx
directly hit spawn npx ENOENT
(anthropics/claude-code#58510).
Use WSL for now; a native Windows launcher is coming.Install the plugin from the marketplace:
Or add the MCP server directly, without the plugin:
Install the plugin from the marketplace:
Or add the MCP server directly, without the plugin:
Clone the repo and install the plugin folder:
Or add the MCP server directly, without the plugin:
Gemini CLI now serves Gemini Code Assist Standard/Enterprise and API-key accounts; on a personal Google account, use Antigravity CLI above.
Install as an extension straight from the public repo:
Or add the server manually to ~/.gemini/settings.json:
Every other host spawns the same stdio server — only the config file and the top-level key differ. Add this block to the host’s MCP config:
| Host | Config file | Note |
|---|---|---|
| Cursor | .cursor/mcp.json | as-is |
| Windsurf | ~/.codeium/windsurf/mcp_config.json | as-is |
| VS Code | .vscode/mcp.json | use the key servers instead of mcpServers |
| Zed | settings.json | use the context_servers shape below |
VS Code (servers key):
Zed (context_servers):
CoDesign runs free on your machine today. When you need more — always-on hosting, your own infrastructure (VPC / on-prem), or a fully bundled design agent that lives in the canvas — the same building block graduates by changing config, not vendors. No lock-in. Talk to us: support@img.ly.
Questions or issues: support@img.ly. This distribution is generated from IMG.LY's source repository.