@visa/cli

AI-powered payments over MCP. Exposes Visa card payment tools as MCP (Model Context Protocol) tools so your AI assistant can pay for image generation, video, music, onchain data queries, and more — charged to a Visa card with authentication confirmation at the point of invocation.

Platform support

Install

npm install -g @visa/cli

MCP setup

Add to your MCP client config:

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "visa": {
      "command": "visa-cli",
      "args": ["mcp"]
    }
  }
}

Once connected, your assistant will have access to all payment tools. The first time you use a paid tool, you'll be prompted to log in and enroll a card.

CLI commands

visa-cli login        # GitHub OAuth — opens browser, stores session token
visa-cli add-card     # Enroll a Visa card via VGS secure form
visa-cli status       # Show auth state, enrolled cards, daily spend remaining
visa-cli api-key create my-demo-app
                      # Create an API key for an app or agent
visa-cli history      # Recent transactions with amounts and any generated media URLs
visa-cli hud enable   # Explicitly pin the Visa HUD below Claude Code input
visa-cli hud disable  # Remove the Visa HUD from Claude Code
visa-cli statusline   # Render the multi-line HUD Claude Code calls automatically
visa-cli mcp          # Start the MCP server

Authentication

Login is GitHub OAuth. Your session token is stored at ~/.visa-mcp/session-token.

visa-cli login    # opens github.com/login/oauth/authorize in your browser
visa-cli status   # verify you're logged in

Card enrollment

Cards are tokenized via VGS — your raw card number never touches Visa servers. add_card opens a hosted VGS Collect form in your browser.

visa-cli add-card

Multiple cards can be enrolled. The first becomes the default; you can switch defaults with set_default_card from within your assistant. To remove a card: remove_card (requires authentication).

Payments & Authentication

Every paid tool call requires authentication. On macOS, this is Touch ID (or device password); on Windows and Linux, payments are server-verified with restricted spending limits. Your assistant will show you the amount and merchant before prompting. If you cancel, the payment is aborted — nothing is charged.

You can set hard limits via the update_spending_controls tool, or check your current limits any time:

visa-cli status

API keys for apps and agents

Approved users can create API keys from the CLI with their existing login:

visa-cli api-key create my-demo-app --tools generate_image_card,run_llm --daily-cap 5
visa-cli api-key list
visa-cli api-key revoke 1

The create command prints the raw vk_... key once. Store it in your app or agent secret store and send it as X-Api-Key to /v1/api/shortcuts/:tool.

MCP tools

Account

Generation

Data

Utility

Dynamic catalog

The tool catalog is fetched live from the auth server at startup (5-minute TTL). If the server is unreachable, it falls back to the compiled-in baseline from @visa/tools.

To see all available tools with current pricing, ask your assistant:

"What tools do you have available?"

Spending controls

Daily limit         — hard cap on total spend per day
Max per-transaction — hard cap per single tool call

Both limits are enforced server-side. Authentication is always required per payment regardless of limits — this cannot be disabled. On macOS this means Touch ID; on other platforms, server-side verification with restricted spending limits applies.

Config & data locations

Troubleshooting

Touch ID prompt doesn't appear (macOS) Make sure visa-cli mcp is running as a foreground process that has access to the macOS security framework. Running inside some sandboxed environments may prevent Touch ID. On Windows and Linux, biometric prompts are not used — payments are server-verified.

"Not logged in" after visa-cli login Restart the MCP server after logging in — your MCP client needs to reconnect to pick up the new session.

Card not showing in get_cards Enrollment is only confirmed after you complete the VGS form in the browser. Call get_cards after finishing the form to verify.

Tool returns an error about daily limit Check your remaining budget with visa-cli status or ask your assistant: "What's my remaining budget today?"

Catalog shows stale tools Delete ~/.visa-mcp/catalog-cache.json and restart the MCP server to force a fresh fetch.

Monorepo context

Request routing (MCP vs MPP vs Studio): docs/agents/ARCHITECTURE.md. Branches and deploy: docs/agents/PIPELINE.md. Contributor workflow: AGENTS.md, doc index: docs/agents/README.md.