Directus vs Ghost

Directus

The built-in MCP server works under the connecting user's permissions, supports OAuth limited to the MCP endpoint and blocks deletes unless an administrator allows them. Since version 12 a licence check caps the free Core tier at 3 Studio seats, 25 collections and 5 flows, and the default tool list carries about 79 KB of instructions.

Ghost

A create needs only a title, updates are checked against updated_at so a stale write is refused, and a Contributor's staff token can draft without being able to publish. The Admin API has no OpenAPI file and one fixed permission set per integration, and 20 security advisories were published between 3 September and 1 October 2026.

Directus

1. Connect with OAuth or an Authorization: Bearer header. Don't put the token in the URL as ?access_token=, where it can be logged
2. Use /mcp?tool_mode=registry when the client loads every tool definition. Default mode sends each tool's full instructions, about 79 KB in total
3. Read the schema tool before writing. Item payloads are untyped objects, so field names and types come only from the data model
4. Publish a version with POST /versions/{id}/promote over REST. The MCP items tool refuses system collections such as directus_versions
5. Count translation and junction tables against the 25-collection Core limit before creating collections

Ghost

1. Sign a fresh HS256 token for each batch of calls. Decode the hex secret to bytes, set kid to the key id, aud to /admin/ and exp at most 5 minutes ahead
2. Set status to draft on every create unless told to publish, and publish later with a PUT that sets status to published
3. GET the post before each PUT and send its updated_at back. Tags and authors in a PUT replace the existing lists
4. Send content as a Lexical JSON string, or add ?source=html and send html. The HTML conversion is lossy unless wrapped in an HTML card
5. Page through lists with limit up to 100 and page. Since Ghost 6.0 limit=all returns 100 items without an error