Quickstart - Neural Draft

You’ll go from zero to a real, server-acknowledged blog post in five steps. The last step is optional but unlocks the part our customers love most: AI codegen tools that generate Neural Draft-native code without you teaching them.

Create a project

Sign up at app.neuraldraft.io/register. The form takes ~90 seconds and asks for the bare minimum: project name, industry, brand voice, brand colors, target languages, and target audience. These six fields populate your brand context — the canonical resource every AI tool reads before it generates anything.

Already have a project? Skip ahead to step 2.

Get your API key

From the dashboard, open Settings → API keys → Create key. Pick a name (e.g. dev-laptop) and the scopes you need.Your key looks like this:

ndsk_live_2NgcaXxFqLPo7K3vR8zHwT5sE9bM1nDc

The prefix tells you the environment: ndsk_live_ is production, ndsk_test_ is the sandbox. Keys are shown once — copy them straight into your secret manager.

Never commit a key to git. Use environment variables, a secret manager, or your platform’s encrypted env (Vercel, Fly, Render). Compromised keys can be rotated from the dashboard at any time.

Now export it for the rest of this guide:

export NEURALDRAFT_API_KEY=ndsk_live_2NgcaXxFqLPo7K3vR8zHwT5sE9bM1nDc

Install the SDK (recommended)

Every endpoint is also a plain HTTP call — fetch, axios, cURL all work — but the official TypeScript SDK gives you typed inputs, typed responses, and a jobs.poll() helper for the async pipelines.

npm install @neuraldraft/sdk

The SDK targets Node 20+, Bun, and modern browsers (server-side; never ship the API key to the client). Python and PHP SDKs are on the roadmap — until they land, use cURL or requests against the OpenAPI spec at https://api.neuraldraft.io/v1/openapi.yaml.

Make your first call

A round trip: verify the key, then create a draft blog post.

import { NeuralDraftClient } from "@neuraldraft/sdk";

const nd = new NeuralDraftClient({
  apiKey: process.env.NEURALDRAFT_API_KEY!,
});

// Verify the key
const me = await nd.projects.me();
console.log(`Hello, ${me.name}`);

// Create a draft blog post
const post = await nd.blogPosts.create({
  title: "Five things we shipped this week",
  content: "<p>It was a busy week.</p>",
  language_code: "en",
  status: "draft",
});

console.log(`Draft created: /blog/${post.slug}`);

# Verify the key
curl https://api.neuraldraft.io/v1/projects/me \
  -H "Authorization: Bearer $NEURALDRAFT_API_KEY"

# Create a draft blog post — note the discriminator: type=manual
curl https://api.neuraldraft.io/v1/blog-posts \
  -H "Authorization: Bearer $NEURALDRAFT_API_KEY" \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -d '{
    "type": "manual",
    "title": "Five things we shipped this week",
    "content": "<p>It was a busy week.</p>",
    "language_code": "en",
    "status": "draft"
  }'

Expected response:

{
  "id": 4711,
  "slug": "five-things-we-shipped-this-week",
  "status": "draft",
  "title": "Five things we shipped this week",
  "language_code": "en",
  "category": null,
  "tags": [],
  "featured_image": null,
  "published_at": null,
  "scheduled_at": null,
  "created_at": "2026-04-19T10:14:22Z",
  "updated_at": "2026-04-19T10:14:22Z"
}

Open app.neuraldraft.io and your draft is already there, ready to edit or publish. You’re done with the API quickstart.

Optional — install the MCP server

This is the part that unlocks the magic: your editor’s AI starts generating Neural Draft-native code automatically.Add the MCP server to Claude Code in one command:

claude mcp add neural-draft --env NEURALDRAFT_API_KEY=$NEURALDRAFT_API_KEY -- npx -y @neuraldraft/mcp

Or paste the snippet into .cursor/mcp.json for Cursor:

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "neural-draft": {
      "command": "npx",
      "args": ["-y", "@neuraldraft/mcp"],
      "env": { "NEURALDRAFT_API_KEY": "ndsk_live_..." }
    }
  }
}

Restart your editor. Now ask the AI:

“Generate a hero section for this site and register it with Neural Draft.”

Watch it read brand://current for your colors and voice, generate the HTML with data-translate keys baked in, and call register_component so the section appears in your admin as editable. No glue code.Full setup (Claude Code, Cursor, Continue, plus the Lovable / v0 / Bolt workaround) is on the MCP setup page.

What’s next

Authentication

Scopes, rotation, environment separation, and the full list of 401/403 failure modes.

Pricing & credits

What every operation costs and what happens when you hit zero.

The five pillars

CMS, blog, social, booking, commerce — what each one gives you and the workflows we see most often.

Webhooks

Skip polling. Get an HTTP POST every time something changes.

​What’s next

Authentication

Pricing & credits

The five pillars

Webhooks

What’s next