Monetization Overview

You've built your server and deployed it. Now decide whether you want to charge subscribers for access.

Monetization on mctx is entirely optional. Your server can run indefinitely, serve subscribers, and grow — without you ever enabling it. If you do want to charge, you keep every dollar subscribers pay you.

What monetization is

When you enable monetization on a server, you set a price (in USD per 1,000 requests). Subscribers pay that price to access your server. Payments go directly to your bank account via your payout account.

mctx takes 0%. No platform fee. Subscribers pay you; you keep 100% of subscriber revenue.

There is one cost mctx absorbs on your behalf: Stripe's per-transaction processing fee on each subscriber charge. You receive 100% of the subscriber price gross — the processing fee never touches your payout.

This is separate from hosting fees, which you pay mctx for per-request infrastructure usage above the free tier. The two financial flows are independent.

Monetization is opt-in

Servers are free to subscribers by default. You can keep it that way indefinitely. There is no deadline to enable monetization and no penalty for not using it.

Good reasons to stay free:

• Your server is primarily a community tool or personal project
• Usage is low and the billing overhead is not worth it
• Your audience is small or early — you want adoption before conversion
• You want to build subscriber trust before introducing pricing

When you are ready to monetize — whether that is day one or year two — it is a single toggle in the dashboard.

What you need to get started

To enable monetization on a server, you need a payout account. This is a one-time setup that takes roughly 10 minutes. You provide your business information and bank account details so payments can reach you.

Payout setup is only required when you want to charge subscribers. Deploying your server and building a subscriber base requires no payment setup at all.

See Set Up Payouts for the step-by-step walkthrough.

How subscribers see your server

Subscribers visit your server's public page at your-slug.mctx.ai. When monetization is enabled, they see:

• Your server name and description
• The subscriber price (displayed as USD per 1,000 requests)
• A subscribe button that takes them through checkout

After subscribing, they get access immediately and can connect your server to any MCP-compatible client.

Subscribers who joined before you enabled monetization are grandfathered — they retain free access. New subscribers pay your current price.

Subscribe to your own server

You can subscribe to your own server for testing and personal use. If your server has monetization enabled, you subscribe at the same rate as any other subscriber — but since you keep 100% of subscriber revenue, the charges effectively return to you.

For details on how self-subscription works and when to use it, see Developer Subscription.

Revenue

You receive 100% of what subscribers pay. Payouts are processed automatically — no action required on your end after setup.

Hosting fees are billed separately by mctx at the end of each calendar month for any usage above the free tier. These are your infrastructure costs, independent of subscriber revenue. See How Payouts Work for how payouts work after your account is active.

When not to monetize

Monetization makes sense when your server has consistent demand and the value to subscribers justifies a price. It may not be the right fit if:

• Usage is low — Hosting fees for low-usage servers are negligible, and adding billing friction may slow subscriber growth
• Your audience is niche or early — Charging too soon can limit adoption during the phase when word-of-mouth matters most
• Billing overhead is not worth it — Payout setup requires business information and ongoing tax reporting. For a side project, that overhead may outweigh the revenue

There is no wrong answer. You can start free, grow a subscriber base, and enable monetization later. Or you can price from day one and filter for subscribers who value your work enough to pay for it.

Next steps

• Set Up Payouts — One-time payout account setup required to enable monetization
• How Payouts Work — How payouts work after your account is active
• Developer Subscription — Subscribe to your own server for testing and personal use

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