Certain aspects of the present disclosure provide techniques for link configuration-specific modulation and coding scheme (MCS). A method that may be performed by a user equipment (UE) includes receiving control information indicating an MCS index corresponding to one or more MCS parameters to be used for a communication link, determining the one or more MCS parameters corresponding to the MCS index, wherein a mapping of the MCS index to the one or more MCS parameters is dependent on a configuration of the communication link, and communicating via the communication link in accordance with the one or more MCS parameters.