KiCad 10 issues

[raffaeler]

I tried the MCP with KiCad 10 and it was able to add a resistor on the schematic.

• issue 1: it is not interactive. It acts on the file and the schematic editor must be closed and re-opened to see any change
• issue 2: when a component is added to the circuit it does not show the correct symbol (a resistor in my test)

Here is the answer from GPT 5.4:

I fixed the schematic entry. The problem was that R1 referenced Device:R, but your schematic’s lib_symbols cache was empty, so KiCad couldn’t resolve the symbol body and reported “symbol not found in Device”.
I inserted the cached Device:R symbol definition directly into C:\Users\xxx\Documents\KiCad\test1\test1.kicad_sch. Reload or reopen the schematic in KiCad once, and R1 should render as a proper resistor.

In the thinking tokens, I can also see AI telling:

It seems that adding symbols through the tool won't work unless the library is available externally.

HTH

[LynnL4]

As a drawing feature, it's still very incomplete – because KiCad doesn't have an API engine for schematic drawing, if I understand correctly. We are also trying to figure out how to complete the drawing functionality.

[LynnL4]

Thank you for the detailed feedback! We've investigated and addressed these issues.
Issue 1: Not interactive (file changes not visible until reopen)
This is a known limitation of the MCP approach. The MCP server modifies .kicad_sch files on disk, but KiCad's schematic editor does not watch for
external file changes in real time. You need to close and reopen the schematic (or the entire project) to see the changes. Unfortunately, KiCad does not currently provide an API for hot-reloading files, so this is not something we can fix on the MCP server side. We recommend saving your work in
KiCad before using MCP tools, then closing and reopening to see the results.

Issue 2: Component symbol not rendering correctly

This was a bug in our add_component_from_library tool. When adding a component, it inserted a (symbol (lib_id "Device:R") ...) reference into
the schematic, but did not insert the corresponding symbol definition into the (lib_symbols) section. KiCad requires the full symbol
definition to render the component — without it, the symbol shows as unresolved.

This is now fixed. The tool will:

1. Locate the KiCad symbol library file (.kicad_sym)
2. Extract the complete symbol definition (graphics, pins, properties)
3. Insert it into the schematic's lib_symbols section
4. Use real pin data from the library instead of hardcoded values

Issue 3: Project creation may fail with KiCad 10

The template path was hardcoded to KiCad/9.0. We've updated the detection logic to automatically find any installed KiCad version (8.0, 9.0, 10.0,
and future versions). It now correctly detects KiCad 10 at C:\Program Files\KiCad\10.0\.

These fixes are in the latest main branch. Please try again and let us know if you encounter any other issues!