Connectors vs. custom tools
description
A "connector" is typically a pre-built, ready-to-use integration (often maintained by Anthropic or a third party) that wraps an MCP server for a specific external product, so a user can enable it without writing any code. A "custom tool" is a tool an application or developer defines and registers directly (for example, in the Managed Agents API or via a hand-written MCP server) — it is not necessarily wrapped in a pre-built connector UI, and it can be scoped to exactly the actions an application wants to allow.
source note
General distinction; exact governance details (e.g. permission-policy handling) vary by product and are covered on subagentpermissions.com — kept general here rather than over-specified.
provenance
created 2026-07-02 08:28:08 · JSON