MCP Goes Stateless, and the State Problem Moves Upstack

MCP Goes Stateless, and the State Problem Moves Upstack

Aug 18, 2026 | Journal

The Model Context Protocol has shed its session layer. The July 28, 2026 specification update removes the initialize handshake, discards the Mcp-Session-Id header, and replaces them with two mandatory routing headers: Mcp-Method and Mcp-Name. A gateway can now inspect...

The stateless task and the invisible pause

Jul 23, 2026 | Dormancy, Systems

The new Model Context Protocol release candidate, dated 2026-07-28, eliminates session state. Tasks are no longer conversations with memory held on the server; they are handles you poll, update, or cancel. Pausing a task becomes mechanically trivial—stop calling...

The stateless turn and the missing dormancy primitive

Jul 14, 2026 | Dormancy, Systems

The latest Model Context Protocol revision, dated 2026-07-28, formalizes something that has been emerging for months: the protocol is committed to statelessness at its core. The _meta field is now explicitly defined as the place where "clients and servers use to...

The great forgetting in MCP’s stateless turn

Jul 13, 2026 | Systems

The Model Context Protocol's July 28 release candidate solves one hard problem and creates another. It eliminates the session entirely—no more initialize handshake, no more Mcp-Session-Id header pinning clients to server instances. In its place: task handles. A...