Spectacular is a free open-source specification workspace for AI-assisted software development.
Spectacular gives coding agents the structured product context they need before they touch the code. Instead of asking AI to infer intent from tickets, chats, and stale documents, Spectacular keeps the functional specification as a living source of truth that is clear for humans and directly available to AI tools.
The built-in MCP server lets agents such as Codex, Cursor, and Claude read your specifications, inspect project changes, and pull only the context they need while they work.
- Maintain the specification as change requests come in
- Give AI agents structured requirements through MCP
- Track progress as requirements move through delivery
- Keep collaborators in sync with live project updates and editing indicators
- Document ambiguities and highlight blockers
- Effortlessly export to Markdown and HTML
- More agent-facing MCP tools
- More export formats
- Dark mode for working late
- External documentation
- Browsable changelog (changes are already being stored!)
- Versioning, including a comparison tool
- Presence indicators and live updates
- Desktop app
Tip
Skip setup, updates, and backups with Spectacular Cloud.
Spectacular is installed and configured like any other Laravel application.
git clone https://github.com/spec-tacul-ar/spectacular.git
cd spectacular
composer setup
php artisan serveTo upgrade, simply grab the latest code and run composer setup again.
If you previously used Spectacular as a solo user, create or register the account that should own your existing projects, then assign any legacy solo projects to it:
php artisan spectacular:solo:migrate your-email@example.comThe solo migration command only claims projects that do not already have collaborators, so shared projects are left untouched.
If you don't have PHP available, you can run the app with Docker. Once ready, you'll find Spectacular running at http://localhost:8000.
docker compose up --buildDocker provides the PHP, Composer, and Node runtime. Your checkout is mounted into the container, so the database and uploaded files stay on your machine.
Upgrades are simple too - just grab the latest code and restart Docker. Rebuild the container when the runtime dependencies change.
Spectacular can keep a project in sync for everyone viewing it and show when another collaborator is editing a project, actor, feature, or requirement. Real-time collaboration is disabled by default, so self-hosted installations continue to work without a WebSocket service.
To enable it, configure a Laravel broadcasting driver and a queue worker for your deployment. See the Laravel broadcasting documentation for supported drivers and configuration instructions.
Connect AI coding agents to Spectacular's MCP server so they can read the latest specification while they work.
Cloud endpoint:
https://spec.tacul.ar/mcp/specifications
Self-hosted endpoint:
https://your-spectacular.example.com/mcp/specifications
The MCP server supports OAuth where your agent supports it. You can also create a bearer token in Account integrations and pass it as an Authorization: Bearer ... header.
See the AI-assisted development docs for Codex, Cursor, Claude, and generic MCP setup examples.
Thank you for considering contributing to Spectacular!
Spectacular has been designed with simplicity in mind so you can customise it for your own needs. If you've made something you think everyone could benefit from, please consider sharing it back.
See CONTRIBUTING.md for more information.
If you discover a security vulnerability within Spectacular, please send an e-mail to Matthew White via matt@matthewwhite.me.uk. All security vulnerabilities will be promptly addressed.
Spectacular - an open-source functional specification manager
Copyright (C) 2026 Spectacular Software Limited
This program is free software: you can redistribute it and/or modify it under the terms of the GNU Affero General Public License as published by the Free Software Foundation, either version 3 of the License, or (at your option) any later version.
This program is distributed in the hope that it will be useful, but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. See the GNU Affero General Public License for more details.
You should have received a copy of the GNU Affero General Public License along with this program. If not, see https://www.gnu.org/licenses/.