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Overview

Cursor discovers skills directly from the skills directory (.claude/skills/ by default) and via the FastSkill MCP server. FastSkill’s job is to install the right skills onto disk and keep them reconciled with your manifest — there is no metadata file to generate or keep in sync.
Modern agents (Cursor, Claude Code, …) read installed skills from the skills directory natively. Just fastskill install (or fastskill add) and the skills are available. Register the MCP server below for richer, tool-based access from inside Cursor.

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Quick start

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MCP registration

Register fastskill as an MCP server inside Cursor with a single command:
After running the command, reload Cursor. The tools exposed by fastskill mcp serve --transport stdio will be callable from the agent.
Deprecated: Manually editing .cursor/mcp.json to add a fastskill MCP entry is deprecated. Use fastskill mcp install instead.

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How Cursor uses the skills

When you ask Cursor to perform a task, it:
  1. Reads available skills from the skills directory (and the FastSkill MCP server, if registered).
  2. Matches task requirements against each skill’s description frontmatter.
  3. Loads the full SKILL.md for relevant skills to get instructions and parameters — the same content fastskill read <skill-id> prints.

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Example

User query: “Help me create a PowerPoint presentation for my quarterly review.” Cursor scans installed skills for presentation-related descriptions, finds a match (e.g. pptx), loads its SKILL.md, and follows the skill’s instructions to complete the task.

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Configuration

Ensure your project has a skill-project.toml and that Cursor and FastSkill agree on the skills directory. The default is .claude/skills/; override it via skills_directory in .fastskill/config.yaml or the --skills-dir flag.

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Multiple skill directories

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Automation

Keep the skills directory reconciled in CI so commits always carry the resolved skill set:

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Troubleshooting

Cursor doesn’t see a skill
Semantic search returns nothing
Check environment readiness

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Summary

FastSkill’s Cursor integration provides:
  • Direct skill discovery — Cursor reads installed skills from the skills directory, no sync step
  • MCP access — register the FastSkill MCP server for tool-based access inside Cursor
  • Reproducible installs — skill-project.toml + skills.lock keep the skill set consistent across the team
  • Optional semantic search — fastskill reindex + fastskill search --local when an embedding provider is configured