Serena

What it does

Serena transforms AI agents into seasoned developers by providing IDE-level understanding of code. It moves beyond simple text search, allowing agents to operate at the symbol level for precise retrieval, editing, and refactoring across large, complex codebases.

Tools

• find_symbol: Locates specific symbols within the project.
• symbol_overview: Provides a structured outline of a file's symbols.
• find_referencing_symbols: Identifies all symbols that reference a specific symbol.
• rename_symbol: Performs a semantic rename of a symbol across the codebase.
• replace_symbol_body: Precisely replaces the implementation of a symbol.
• insert_after_symbol / insert_before_symbol: Adds code relative to a specific symbol.
• safe_delete: Removes a symbol while ensuring no broken references remain.

Installation

Install via uv:

uv tool install -p 3.13 serena-agent@latest --prerelease=allow
serena init

Claude Desktop config:

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "serena": {
      "command": "serena",
      "args": ["mcp"]
    }
  }
}

Supported hosts

Claude Desktop, Claude Code, Codex, OpenCode, Gemini-CLI, VS Code Copilot, Cursor, JetBrains IDEs.