# Record runtime

Bring the tool back from the machine — this is also how Tooling Metrics captures how long it ran.

Source: https://support.toolingmetrics.com/en/production/tutorials/record-runtime/
Updated: 2026-10-29

**Prerequisites:** A tool has been running in a machine.
**Required permission:** Inventory → Return Lists — User or above. Admins can validate any return list; Managers and Users only the return lists they created.

Tooling Metrics doesn't have a separate "log a runtime entry" screen. Runtime is captured in one step, at the moment the tool physically comes back from the machine — so recording it starts with a Return List.

## Start the return

1. In the sidebar, click **Inventory → Return Lists** → **+ Create**.
1. Select the **Source** — the Machine the tool is running on. Tooling Metrics prefills a line for every tool currently on it.
1. Click **Mark as Todo**. The return list moves to **Ready**, or to **Waiting** if a line isn't ready yet. From **Waiting**, click **Check Availability** to recheck.

![Unsaved return list sourced from Haas VF-1, with five tools prefilled and suggested destinations.](https://support.toolingmetrics.com/guides/return-list-machine-eng.webp)

*Fig. 1: Starting a return from a machine — every tool currently loaded is prefilled as a line.*

This is as far as this tutorial takes it — validating the return list, and entering the runtime itself, is the next step.

## What recording runtime actually updates

Once you validate (next tutorial), for each cutting edge mounted in a returned tool:
- **Usage Life** — total accumulated runtime — increases by whatever you enter.
- **Remaining Life** (Life Limit minus Usage Life) recalculates.
- **Condition** recalculates from that ratio — Pre-warning at 80% consumed, Warning at 95%, Expired at 100% — unless the cutting edge is marked Broken.
- Usage cost is not posted at this moment. Cost-per-pick items post when the tool lands on the machine, and time-based items post once a day while they stay on a machine — see [Record Tool Runtime](https://support.toolingmetrics.com/en/production/guides/record-runtime/#notes).

## Setting a life limit

Remaining Life is measured against the **Life Limit** of each cutting edge. Set it on the tool's **Cutting Edges** tab by editing the cutting edge; the tool form itself has no Life Limit field.

## Next

[Return tools](https://support.toolingmetrics.com/en/production/tutorials/return-tools/) — validate the return and enter the runtime.