# Context that travels

Canonical source: https://maguyva.ai/blog/context-that-travels

License: text under [CC BY 4.0](https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/); code samples under [MIT-0](https://opensource.org/license/mit-0); the Maguyva name, logos, brand assets and other code are not covered. Details: [maguyva.ai/license](https://maguyva.ai/license).

Date: 2026-09-07 · Author: Maguyva Team

> Cursor's indexer is excellent inside Cursor. Maguyva is the hosted MCP map the same agent can query from other editors, CLIs, and CI.

Cursor's indexer is excellent inside Cursor. Tab complete, inline edit, chat, and the agent inside that window already sit on top of a project index Cursor operates for the opened workspace. If Cursor is the only surface you write in, and that index already finds the right files, stay there. That is the honest stay-put case, and it is the right first sentence of this page.

This piece is about the other half of a common week. The same repository is also opened in Claude Code, asked about from Codex CLI, reviewed on a second machine, or queried by an agent running in CI. The question is not "which indexer is better." The question is whether the map the agent trusts in one window is the same map it trusts in the next.

Maguyva is that traveling map. It is a remote MCP codebase-context layer. The agent queries it the same way it queries any other MCP tool. Results come back as ranked paths with line numbers. Cursor stays the editor. The context is what moves.

## What Cursor's indexer is for

Cursor's built-in indexing exists so chat, agent, and search inside the editor can retrieve relevant code instead of relying only on whatever fits in the model's raw context window. That is the right design for an IDE. The index is native to Cursor. It is not an MCP server and is not reachable from any other client.

How it works, as described in Cursor's public docs and Cursor's own account at time of writing: the primary search path is no longer a cloud-embedding index. Cursor's team stated on their community forum that dedicated semantic/embedding-based search is being wound down in favor of grep-based retrieval, because current models search a live tree well enough on their own without one. In its place is Instant Grep, a local search index built from n-grams, inverted lists, and bloom filters, kept in a memory-mapped lookup table so queries resolve on the developer's own machine rather than a server.

The index itself lives inside the repository's own `.git/cursor/` directory, anchored to a specific git commit; edits since that commit layer on top of it instead of triggering a rescan, and the index only rebuilds when local state has drifted far from what it was built against. Because it sits inside `.git`, it is never tracked and never pushed — delete the folder and the index is gone. `.gitignore` is respected by construction, since only git-tracked content is eligible, and `.cursorignore` is enforced on the read path. There is no server-side embedding step and no remote vector database in that path anymore. Earlier docs described a cloud-assisted design — chunk encryption, a Merkle-tree sync, cross-teammate index reuse — and Cursor's own team has since said that design is being turned down, so this piece no longer describes it as current.

A standout inside the editor is Cursor's Explore subagent. It can spawn multiple parallel searches in its own context window on a faster model and return only the relevant findings, so the main conversation does not swell with search hits. That is a genuine in-editor strength. Keep it.

Multi-root workspaces are supported: each opened folder's context is available to Agent. Some git-dependent features such as worktrees are disabled in multi-root setups, and Cloud Agents do not support multi-root workspaces at all.

None of that is a reason to leave Cursor. It is a precise description of a map that is excellent where it lives.

## What "travels" actually means

A map travels when the same questions return the same kind of answer, with citations you can open, from more than one client.

- In Cursor: "Where is `parseConfig` defined, and who calls it?"
- In Claude Code, on the same repo: the same question.
- In Codex CLI, on a review box that never opened the Cursor window: the same question.
- In a CI agent that speaks MCP: the same question, against the same hosted snapshot.

If each surface builds its own private index, you do not have one map. You have several caches that drift. The editor index can be current for the tree on disk. The CLI session can be a day behind. The CI job can be looking at a different checkout. The agent will still sound confident.

Cursor's indexer is not supposed to solve that. Because it lives inside the editor, the context it builds is for that editor. A reader who also needs a CLI, a CI pipeline, or a different editor needs a separate tool for those surfaces. That is a scope fact, not a defect. Maguyva is the separate tool.

A published language count for Cursor's indexer is not stated in the notes this draft is allowed to use. Maguyva publishes 279+ languages and text-based technologies. Pricing for Cursor is likewise not copied here; see their pricing page. Maguyva bills per workspace, not per seat, with published plans at $0, $19, $49, and $149 depending on indexed footprint and workspace size.

## One hosted map, every MCP client

Maguyva is a remote MCP server. You connect GitHub, pick the repositories, and the cloud pipeline builds symbols, graph edges, and a ranked map. You add an API key to the MCP config of the client you already use. Maguyva has setup guides for 24 documented MCP clients — including Cursor — and can connect to other MCP-compatible clients that support standard MCP configuration.

The [Cursor setup page](/for-cursor) is the editor-specific path if that is where you work. The same server answers Claude Code, VS Code, Windsurf, Codex CLI, and the rest. You do not switch editors. You give every agent the same tool surface: 11 customer-facing MCP tools across search, symbols, dependency analysis, file retrieval, repository context, and deterministic utility workflows. Semantic, structural, graph, and text retrieval are fused into ranked results.

That is the portability benefit. The citations you graded in Cursor this morning are the same shape of citations Codex CLI will return tonight. File path and line number. Open them. If they are wrong, you see it. If they are right, the next edit has a place to land. The approved claim is fewer hallucinated edits, not a promise that every edit is correct.

Freshness is published. Snapshots are timestamped, so the agent knows which version it is reading. Rebuild cadence is daily on the free plan and hourly on paid plans. The honest limit is un-synced local work: an edit that exists only in a working tree is not in the hosted map yet. That limit is the same no matter which client you query from, which is the point. Drift between clients is no longer a second, hidden limit.

The [docs](/docs) give the activation loop that applies to every client: index one repo you already know, connect the client, ask one question you can verify. Do that once in Cursor. Do it again from the CLI you actually use on review days. If both answers cite the same handler, the map traveled.

## How the two maps sit next to each other

Use both. They are not alternatives in the comparison-page sense.

1. Keep Cursor's indexer on for the project on disk. Let Explore, Instant Grep, and the in-editor agent use it. That loop is native and fast.
2. Add Maguyva as an MCP server in Cursor so the same session can also ask the hosted workspace map. Cursor is a documented Maguyva client. You are not choosing one index and deleting the other.
3. Add the same Maguyva server to Claude Code, Codex CLI, or any other MCP client that touches the repo. One API key shape. One workspace.
4. If a CI agent is MCP-compatible, point it at the same server. It will read the same timestamped snapshot the laptop did.

The editor index remains the best tool for "what is on disk in this window, right now." The hosted map is the best tool for "what does this workspace look like to every agent that will touch it today." Those sentences do not compete.

Workspace quotas are published on the [pricing page](/pricing): repos, indexed lines, and users, billed per workspace. Agents and humans share the same user count. Start free on a repo you can already grade. Raise the workspace only after the citations survive contact with the tree.

## What this page does not claim

It does not claim that Cursor's indexer is weak, incomplete, or a reason to switch editors. The first sentence of this draft is the opposite.

It does not claim Maguyva replaces Instant Grep or the Explore subagent. Those are Cursor features. They stay in Cursor.

It does not invent a language count, a latency figure, or a token-savings number for either product. Unknown figures stay unpublished.

It does not pretend un-pushed local work is in the hosted map. Timestamped snapshots make that limit visible. They do not remove it.

The test is ordinary. Index one repo you already know. Ask one question you can verify, first in Cursor, then in a second MCP client. Context that travels is the same citation in both places.

`// same map, wherever you opened it.`