Compartment vs Cortex

In-depth architectural comparison of the Compartment and Cortex MCP servers. Compare execution transports, security boundaries, tool capabilities, quality scores, and ready-to-paste client installation snippets for Claude, Cursor, Windsurf, and VS Code.

Which MCP Server Should You Choose?

Choose Compartment when:

• You need dedicated capabilities in the Knowledge & Memory domain.
• You prefer local stdio subprocess transport architecture.
• Your security boundary fits: No auth required (Free / Open Source).

Explore Compartment Details

Choose Cortex when:

• You need dedicated capabilities in the Knowledge & Memory domain.
• You prefer local stdio subprocess transport architecture.
• Your security boundary fits: No auth required (Free / Open Source).

Explore Cortex Details

Feature & Specification Comparison

Specification	Compartment Knowledge & Memory	Cortex Knowledge & Memory
Summary	Fully offline, encrypted-at-rest vector memory for AI agents. AEAD-encrypted vectors, no cloud.	Local multi-client RAG server over the Model Context Protocol.
Category & Scope	Knowledge & Memory	Knowledge & Memory
Quality signal

Tools & Capabilities Breakdown

Ready-to-Paste Client Configurations

Paste either (or both) of these JSON server blocks into your client config file (e.g. claude_desktop_config.json or ~/.cursor/mcp.json).

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "compartment": {
      "command": "uvx",
      "args": [
        "compartment"
      ]
    }
  }
}

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "cortex-3": {
      "command": "npx",
      "args": [
        "-y",
        "cortex-3"
      ]
    }
  }
}

Related MCP Server Comparisons