Built-in Glean tools

Glean provides the following built-in tools that you can add to any MCP server. You can mix and match any combination of these tools based on your server's purpose.

Glean groups some built-in tools into managed toolsets, which you add as a single unit. Glean owns each managed toolset and updates the built-in tools it contains. You add the remaining built-in tools one at a time. See More tools.

To add these tools to a server, see Create and manage MCP servers. The tool picker shows only the tools your deployment supports.

Artifacts

Add the Artifacts managed toolset to let users save locally produced content to their Glean Library and manage it from their MCP hosts. A host can land HTML, documents, and other output in the Library as an artifact with a stable link, instead of leaving it stranded in the host. The toolset includes:

• upload_artifact — save locally produced content as a new artifact in the user's Library and return a shareable link
• update_artifact — save a new version of an existing artifact
• share_artifact — grant people view access by email to an artifact the user owns

Keep search and read_document enabled so users can find and retrieve existing content before they update it. Artifact tools run with each connected user's Glean permissions. The share_artifact tool is available only when Chat Sharing is enabled.

Memory

Add the Memory managed toolset to give hosts the user's long-term memories and personalization data from Glean Memory. It includes:

• memory — read, add, update, and delete the user's memories
• memory_schema — discover memory categories, payload schemas, storage limits, and filterable fields

Keep both tools together. A host that can write memories but can't read the schema doesn't know which categories and fields are valid.

Image generation

Add the Image generation managed toolset to let users generate and edit images from their MCP hosts and save them to their Glean Library. It includes:

• create_image — generate a new image from a prompt, with an optional title and aspect ratio, and save it as an image artifact in the Library
• edit_image — modify an existing image artifact from a natural-language instruction

Image tools run with each connected user's Glean permissions and image generation eligibility. A user who can't generate images in Glean doesn't get these tools, even when the toolset is enabled on the server. Image discovery uses search and read_document, so keep them enabled. For who can use image generation and how to turn it on, see Image Generation in Glean and Contextual images setup.

Dynamic skills and tools

The Dynamic skills and tools managed toolset lets a connected MCP host discover Glean Skills and call connected tools when it needs them. It keeps the host from loading every connected tool at the start of a session. The toolset includes:

• find_skills finds Glean Skills that match the host's request.
• read_skill_files reads the files for a Skill after the host finds it.
• run_tool runs a connected tool selected by the Skill.

Select this toolset when users of the server need access to Glean Skills through MCP. Glean does not add it to every server automatically. Add it to each server that needs it.

More tools

Add any of these built-in tools to a server on their own. You can also add memory and memory_schema individually, or together as the Memory managed toolset.

Tool	Description
search	Search across your entire knowledge base with permission-aware results.
chat	Interactive conversations with Glean's AI assistant.
read_document	Retrieve specific documents by ID or URL.
code_search	Search your codebase and repositories.
employee_search	Find people and expertise in your organization.
user_activity	Retrieve the user's recent Glean activity to help summarize work, prepare status updates, or recover recently used documents.
memory	Read, add, update, and delete user memories and personalization.
memory_schema	Discover available memory categories, payload schemas, storage limits, and filterable fields.
gmail_search	Search Gmail messages and threads.
meeting_lookup	Find meeting recordings and notes.
outlook_search	Search Outlook emails and calendar.
web_search	Search the public web for information that isn't in your connected sources.
gemini_web_search	Search the web with Google Gemini.
data_analysis	Route analytical questions to the right BI tool or data warehouse.
knowledge_graph_query	Query the Knowledge Graph for entities and their relationships.
knowledge_graph_schema	Retrieve the Knowledge Graph schema, including entity types and predicates.

Deprecated tools

Glean flags tools whose backing capability has been deprecated so you can move to a supported replacement. A deprecated tool stays visible in the server configuration and remains available to connected host applications, so it keeps working until you replace it. The deprecation flag and replacement guidance appear in the Admin console.

When a server includes a deprecated tool, the configuration shows a warning banner: "This MCP server includes deprecated tools. Use replacement tools when possible." Each deprecated tool is listed with its replacement, or with "No replacement tool listed" when none is available.

In the tool list, a deprecated tool shows a Deprecated badge. Hover over the badge to see the suggested replacement.

When you add external tools, Glean hides deprecated tools from the picker by default. To review them, turn on Show deprecated tools. Glean turns this on for you when the server you're editing already includes a deprecated tool, so you can find it and swap in the replacement.

See also

• Create and manage MCP servers to add these tools to a server
• Add agents as tools to expose Glean agents through MCP
• MCP server best practices for choosing which tools to include