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What is a Plugin?

A Plugin is a curated bundle of tools from one or more MCP servers (“connectors”). It gives you a single MCP endpoint you can add to your AI client, while still enforcing all the underlying Runlayer policies and access controls. Plugins are useful when you want:
  • A purpose-built toolset for a workflow (e.g. “Release Management”, “Customer Support”, “On-call”)
  • One connection in your MCP client instead of many
  • A safe, shareable setup (private to you or public within your workspace)
Plugins currently expose tools only (no resources or prompts).

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Creating a Plugin

1

Open Plugins

Navigate to Plugins in the sidebar.
2

Create a new Plugin

Click Create new and provide a name and optional description.
3

Choose privacy

  • Private: only you can access it
  • Public: anyone in your workspace can access it
4

Add connectors and pick tools

Select the MCP servers you want, then choose which tools from each server should be included in the Plugin.

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Using a Plugin in an MCP client

Open the Plugin and click Add to MCP Client. Runlayer will generate the correct connection details for your selected client.

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Managing connectors and tools

  • Add connectors: open a Plugin and click Add Connectors
  • Remove connectors: open the connector menu and choose Remove connector
  • Review tools: expand a connector to see the tools included in the Plugin

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Dynamic tools

Dynamic tools are an optimization for Plugins with many tools.

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How it works

When Dynamic tools is enabled, the Plugin does not expose every underlying tool definition directly. Instead, it exposes two meta-tools:
  • search_tools: search for the most relevant tools by describing what you want to do (returns tool names + descriptions + input schemas)
  • execute_tool: execute a specific tool by name with arguments (typically chosen from search_tools results)
This creates a two-step flow: search → execute.

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Why it’s useful

Sending hundreds of tool definitions (names, descriptions, and JSON schemas) to the LLM can push requests onto a “context route” that:
  • Degrades model performance (more noise in the prompt)
  • Increases latency (more tokens processed)
  • Increases cost (larger prompts and tool schemas)
Dynamic tools keeps the prompt/tooling surface small until the model actually needs a specific tool.

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When to use it

  • Enable Dynamic tools for Plugins with many connectors/tools, or when tool schemas are large.
  • Disable it for small Plugins where you want the model to see all tools immediately without an extra search step.