yourmemory 1.1.3

Persistent memory for Claude — Ebbinghaus forgetting curve, semantic deduplication, MCP-native

YourMemory

+16pp better recall than Mem0 on LoCoMo. 100% stale memory precision. Biologically-inspired memory decay for AI agents.

Persistent memory for Claude that works like human memory — important things stick, forgotten things fade, outdated facts get demoted automatically.

Early stage — feedback and ideas welcome.

---

Benchmarks

Evaluated against Mem0 (free tier) on the public LoCoMo dataset (Snap Research) — 10 conversation pairs, 200 QA pairs total.

Metric	YourMemory	Mem0	Margin
LoCoMo Recall@5 (200 QA pairs)	34%	18%	+16pp
Stale Memory Precision (5 contradiction pairs)	100%	0%	+100pp
Memories pruned (noise reduction)	20%	0%	—

Full methodology and per-sample results in BENCHMARKS.md. Read the writeup: I built memory decay for AI agents using the Ebbinghaus forgetting curve

---

How it works

Ebbinghaus Forgetting Curve

base_λ      = DECAY_RATES[category]
effective_λ = base_λ × (1 - importance × 0.8)
strength    = importance × e^(-effective_λ × days) × (1 + recall_count × 0.2)
score       = cosine_similarity × strength

Decay rate varies by category — failure memories fade fast, strategies persist longer:

Category	base λ	survives without recall	use case
strategy	0.10	~38 days	What worked — successful patterns
fact	0.16	~24 days	User preferences, identity
assumption	0.20	~19 days	Inferred context
failure	0.35	~11 days	What went wrong — environment-specific errors

Importance additionally modulates the decay rate within each category. Memories recalled frequently gain recall_count boosts that counteract decay. Memories below strength 0.05 are pruned automatically.

---

Setup

Zero infrastructure required — uses SQLite out of the box. Two commands and you're done.

1. Install

pip install yourmemory

All dependencies are installed automatically. No clone, no separate download steps needed.

2. Wire into your AI client

The database is created automatically at ~/.yourmemory/memories.db on first use. No .env file needed.

Claude Code

Add to ~/.claude/settings.json:

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "yourmemory": {
      "command": "yourmemory"
    }
  }
}

Reload Claude Code (Cmd+Shift+P → Developer: Reload Window).

Cline (VS Code)

In Cline → MCP Servers → Edit MCP Settings:

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "yourmemory": {
      "command": "yourmemory",
      "args": [],
      "env": {
        "DATABASE_URL": "",
        "YOURMEMORY_USER": "your_name"
      }
    }
  }
}

Replace your_name with your name. Save — Cline will connect automatically.

Note: If Cline can't find the yourmemory command, run which yourmemory in terminal to get the full path and use that instead.

Claude Desktop

Add to ~/Library/Application Support/Claude/claude_desktop_config.json (macOS) or %APPDATA%\Claude\claude_desktop_config.json (Windows):

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "yourmemory": {
      "command": "yourmemory"
    }
  }
}

Restart Claude Desktop.

Any MCP-compatible client

YourMemory is a standard stdio MCP server. The command is simply yourmemory. Add it to any client that supports MCP servers using the same pattern above.

3. Add memory instructions to your project

Copy sample_CLAUDE.md into your project root as CLAUDE.md and replace:

• YOUR_NAME — your name (e.g. Alice)
• YOUR_USER_ID — used to namespace memories (e.g. alice)

Claude will now follow the recall → store → update workflow automatically on every task.

---

PostgreSQL (optional — for teams or large datasets)

If you have PostgreSQL + pgvector, create a .env file:

DATABASE_URL=postgresql://YOUR_USER@localhost:5432/yourmemory

The backend is selected automatically — postgresql:// in DATABASE_URL → Postgres + pgvector, anything else → SQLite.

macOS

brew install postgresql@16 pgvector && brew services start postgresql@16
createdb yourmemory

Ubuntu / Debian

sudo apt install postgresql postgresql-contrib postgresql-16-pgvector
createdb yourmemory

One-liner setup script (macOS/Linux): bash scripts/setup_db.sh handles install + DB creation automatically.

---

MCP Tools

Tool	When to call
recall_memory	Start of every task — surface relevant context
store_memory	After learning a new preference, fact, failure, or strategy
update_memory	When a recalled memory is outdated or needs merging

store_memory accepts an optional category parameter to control decay rate:

# Failure — decays in ~11 days (environment changes fast)
store_memory(
    content="OAuth for client X fails — redirect URI must be app.example.com",
    importance=0.6,
    category="failure"
)

# Strategy — decays in ~38 days (successful patterns stay relevant)
store_memory(
    content="Cursor pagination fixed the 30s timeout on large user queries",
    importance=0.7,
    category="strategy"
)

Example session

User: "I prefer tabs over spaces in all my Python projects"

Claude:
  → recall_memory("tabs spaces Python preferences")   # nothing found
  → store_memory("Sachit prefers tabs over spaces in Python", importance=0.9, category="fact")

Next session:
  → recall_memory("Python formatting")
  ← {"content": "Sachit prefers tabs over spaces in Python", "strength": 0.87}
  → Claude now knows without being told again

---

Decay Job

Runs automatically every 24 hours on startup — no cron needed. Memories below strength 0.05 are pruned.

---

REST API

# Store
curl -X POST http://localhost:8000/memories \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -d '{"userId":"u1","content":"Prefers dark mode","importance":0.8}'

# Retrieve
curl -X POST http://localhost:8000/retrieve \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -d '{"userId":"u1","query":"UI preferences"}'

# List all
curl "http://localhost:8000/memories?userId=u1"

# Update
curl -X PUT http://localhost:8000/memories/42 \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -d '{"content":"Prefers dark mode in all apps","importance":0.85}'

# Delete
curl -X DELETE http://localhost:8000/memories/42

---

Stack

• PostgreSQL + pgvector — vector similarity search
• sentence-transformers — local embeddings (all-mpnet-base-v2, 768 dims, no external service needed)
• FastAPI — REST server
• APScheduler — automatic 24h decay job
• MCP — Claude integration via Model Context Protocol

---

Architecture

Claude Code
    │
    ├── recall_memory(query)
    │       └── embed → cosine similarity → score = sim × strength → top-k
    │
    ├── store_memory(content, importance, category?)
    │       └── is_question? → reject
    │           category: fact | assumption | failure | strategy
    │           embed() → INSERT memories
    │
    └── update_memory(id, new_content)
            └── embed(new_content) → UPDATE memories

PostgreSQL (pgvector)
    └── memories
        ├── embedding vector(768)
        ├── importance float
        ├── recall_count int
        └── last_accessed_at

---

Dataset Reference

Benchmarks use the LoCoMo dataset by Snap Research — a public long-context memory benchmark for multi-session dialogue.

Maharana et al. (2024). LoCoMo: Long Context Multimodal Benchmark for Dialogue. Snap Research.

---

License

Copyright 2026 Sachit Misra

Licensed under the Apache License, Version 2.0. You may use, modify, and distribute this software freely with attribution. Patent protection included — contributors cannot sue users over patent claims.