Apple Hig MCP Server

Complete Apple development guidance: Human Interface Guidelines (design) + Technical Documentation for iOS, macOS, watchOS, tvOS, and visionOS

Local serverstdio

What is the Apple Hig MCP MCP server?

Complete Apple development guidance: Human Interface Guidelines (design) + Technical Documentation for iOS, macOS, watchOS, tvOS, and visionOS. The apple hig mcp mcp server wraps that behind the Model Context Protocol, so an assistant can use it through 6 defined tools rather than through you.

Its toolset

Everything the assistant can do here goes through one of these:

  • search_human_interface_guidelines — Search Apple HIG with platform filters
  • search_technical_documentation — Search Apple API documentation
  • Framework — specific searches (SwiftUI, UIKit, AppKit, etc.)
  • search_unified — Combined design + technical documentation search
  • Cross — references design guidelines with implementation details
  • Examples — The Examples tool exposed by this server

Adding it to your client

@modelcontextprotocol/inspector on npm is all you need. Most clients run it directly, so configuration is a few lines and a restart.

When to reach for it

This sits in the knowledge and memory group, where several servers overlap in what they claim to do but differ sharply once you actually set them up. Apple Hig MCP's toolset — search_human_interface_guidelines, search_technical_documentation, Framework and 3 more — is a fair guide to whether it matches your workflow. It is maintained by tmaasen; worth a glance at recent repository activity before you build anything load-bearing on it.

We check each listing at SyncDev against the project's documentation before it goes live — if something here drifts out of date, it is a bug worth reporting.

Caveats

  • It runs with your machine's permissions. That is convenient and also the reason to think about what you point it at before you approve a tool call.
  • MCP clients confirm each tool call by default. Leave that on until you have watched what the apple hig mcp mcp server does with a few real requests.

Available tools

ToolWhat it does
search_human_interface_guidelinesSearch Apple HIG with platform filters
search_technical_documentationSearch Apple API documentation
Frameworkspecific searches (SwiftUI, UIKit, AppKit, etc.)
search_unifiedCombined design + technical documentation search
Crossreferences design guidelines with implementation details
ExamplesThe Examples tool exposed by this server.

How to install the Apple Hig MCP MCP server

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "apple-hig": {
      "command": "npx",
      "args": ["-y", "@modelcontextprotocol/inspector"]
    }
  }
}

Add to claude_desktop_config.json, then restart Claude Desktop.

Example prompts to try

  • Use Apple Hig MCP to search human interface guidelines.
  • Use Apple Hig MCP to search technical documentation.
  • Use Apple Hig MCP to Framework.

Frequently asked questions

It connects Apple Hig MCP to MCP-compatible AI assistants such as Claude and Cursor, exposing 6 tools (search_human_interface_guidelines, search_technical_documentation, Framework, and more) that the assistant can call on your behalf. Instead of copying data back and forth by hand, the assistant works with Apple Hig MCP directly.