> ## Documentation Index
> Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://docs.getmcpulse.com/llms.txt
> Use this file to discover all available pages before exploring further.

# Dead tool

> Registered, never called, and charging every session for the privilege.

> `export_report` has never been called but costs 0.4k tokens of schema every session — \$2.14 across 1,782 sessions in this range.

## When it fires

|           |                                                          |
| --------- | -------------------------------------------------------- |
| Condition | Registered in the startup payload, **no calls in range** |
| Severity  | Always **medium**                                        |
| Minimum   | A schema size above zero                                 |
| Lag       | None — live                                              |

Unlike the other four rules, this one has no minimum call count — zero calls is the condition.

## What it means

Every tool your server registers is sent to the model at the **start of every session**, whether or not it is ever called. A tool nobody uses is a fixed toll on every conversation your server has.

The insight prices it exactly that way: schema bytes converted to tokens, then multiplied by the number of [sessions](/metrics/sessions) in the range. With no sessions recorded yet it states the per-session cost alone.

## Before you act

**Widen the range.** A tool used once a month is dead in a 7-day window and alive in a 90-day one. This rule is scoped to what you are looking at.

**Check whether it can be reached.** If it needs an argument no other tool returns, no description will fix it. That is a wiring problem, and it is invisible from every other screen.

## Three real options

|                             |                                                                     |
| --------------------------- | ------------------------------------------------------------------- |
| **Remove it**               | The schema cost goes away entirely and immediately                  |
| **Rewrite the description** | Lead with the question it answers, not the operation it performs    |
| **Merge it**                | Fold it into a neighbour as a parameter — one schema instead of two |

Merging is usually the best of the three when the tool does something genuinely useful that the model never finds. MCPulse's own [MCP server](/mcp/overview) covers sixteen metrics with five tools for exactly this reason: narrowing is a parameter, not a name.

## It goes away on its own

Nothing is marked dead permanently. One call inside the window and the tool is simply a tool with one call.

## Related

* [Dead tools](/tools/dead)
* [Schema size](/metrics/schema-size)
* [Find dead tools](/guides/find-dead-tools)