Tool belt

The Tool belt is a utility belt that can be accessed in the Worn Equipment screen. It allows players to carry and use basic tools anytime without taking up space in their inventory. This includes items such as a pickaxe, hatchet, hammer, tinderbox, fishing rods, crafting and farming tools. It was released on 6 December 2011 along with the Money pouch.

It has no requirements and does not take up any inventory space. It also does not contribute towards the player's weight. Items can be added to the tool belt by right-clicking on an item while it is in the player's inventory and selecting the Add-to-tool belt option. Following an update on 13 March 2012, all non-quest items are automatically added to a players tool belt. Once the items are added, they remain there and cannot be retrieved. Upon death, all items in the tool belt are kept. This is true even when the player is skulled or dies in the wilderness.

Because of the tool belt, players are now able to click on resources instead of having to use a tool on the resource. For example, players can click on a log to light it instead of using a tinderbox on every individual log. Alternatively, right-clicking on a log gives a list of other possible actions that can be used with the log.

Currently, only the bronze pickaxe and hatchet can be added to the belt, making the tool belt unsuitable for use in training woodcutting and mining at higher levels. It is still best to equip pickaxes and hachets to be able to use all 28 inventory spaces while mining or chopping. Though not helpful for woodcutting and mining, the tool belt is quite useful for many other skills, for most quests, or during general exploring as you no longer have to worry about taking up inventory space carrying basic items wherever you go.

Items
There are currently 39 item slots in tool belt divided into 4 categories.

Fishing Items

 * Crayfish cage
 * Fishing rod
 * Small fishing net
 * Big fishing net (m)
 * Fly fishing rod
 * Harpoon
 * Lobster pot
 * Barbarian rod (m)

Crafting Items

 * Needle
 * Glassblowing pipe (m)
 * Amulet mould
 * Bracelet mould (m)
 * Necklace mould
 * Ring mould
 * Tiara mould
 * Ammo mould (m)
 * Bolt mould (m)
 * Holy mould
 * Unholy mould (m)
 * Sickle mould (m)
 * Chain link mould (m)

Farming Items

 * Rake (m)
 * Seed dibber (m)
 * Spade - for Farming use, or for entering the Giant Mole Lair
 * Gardening trowel (m)
 * Secateurs (m)

Usage
Once an item is added to the tool belt, actions that would normally require using a tool on an item become options on the item to be manipulated. For example, once a tinderbox is added to the tool belt, a player can right-click a log and choose the Light option. Be careful left-clicking craftable items like Unicorn horns as this could lead to a player's character performing an action the player did not intend.

Free-to-play tools are available for use on free-to-play servers. Thus, as an example, a free-player may light logs using a stored tinderbox, saving bank space on the numerous tools used.

Restricted usages and bugs

 * The items on the normal tool belt cannot be used in Dungeoneering. On 11 April 2012 a second tool belt was added for use inside Daemonheim, containing all the tools used down there, including an upgradable novite pickaxe and hatchet.
 * The Tools in the tool belt cannot be used with many quest items such as the lighthouse in Horror from the Deep, the Bone Key from Shilo Village, chemical soaked bricks in The Dig Site, lighting the Ceremonial Brazier in Lunar Diplomacy and digging up saplings in Meeting History. This is most likely unintentional and will probably be fixed soon.
 * You cannot add a sextant to the tool belt even though it is required along with the watch and chart for clue scrolls. This is because the sextant is the item which is actively used to find your co-ordinates, while the watch and chart merely have to be in your inventory while not being clicked on.
 * Spades stored on tool belts can't be used for digging at the ground, such as Treasure Trails. They only work on objects with a dig or harvest option. It also doesn't work for the vine flower, bush and fruit tree patches at Herblore Habitat, as the right-click "Clear" option only appears when the crops are fully grown.
 * You can get Willow branches from a willow tree you planted with secateurs that are stored in your tool belt by simply selecting the right click option Gather-Branches. Note, however, that you must select Gather-Branches for each branch you wish to gather, instead of selecting it once and letting it automatically cut all of the branches the tree has.
 * You cannot use the pestle and mortar in a tool belt to grind Armadyl shards. This has not been fixed yet.
 * When chopping down an Evil tree with a loaned dragon hatchet, you will use the tool belt bronze hatchet instead.
 * While having a harpoon in your tool belt, but none in your inventory, or having no barb-tailed harpoon equipped, you will start using the barbarian fishing style, provided that you have done the barbarian training with Otto. This is a bug, which Jagex is trying to fix. (Quick find code: 15-16-807-63432405)
 * The spade in the tool belt cannot be used to 'collect coke' and 'refuel stove' at the Blast Furnace. There is however a spade spawn nearby.

Fixed bugs

 * Upon release, you could not use the knife on the tool belt to skin dead giant snakes in Temple Trekking/Burgh de Rott Ramble. This bug has been fixed.
 * Upon release, you could not use the secateurs on the tool belt to gather branches from a player-grown willow tree, despite the provision of a right click Gather-Branches option. This right click option does now work for one branch at a time (see Restricted Usages and Bugs, above).
 * At one point, if you had an item considered as a weapon in your tool belt during Roving Elves quest, you would not be able to enter Glarial's Tomb. This glitch has since been fixed.
 * Players could not use the knife on the tool belt to make chopped onions when the tool belt was first released, they could not even make them when they also have a knife in their inventory. This was fixed on 12 December 2011.
 * Players couldn't chisel detail on the statue in Enakhra's Lament using the chisel on the tool belt. This was reported as fixed in an update on 2 February 2012.

Trivia

 * On the day of release a new task, Shear Convenience was added into Lumbridge/Draynor Beginner Tasks to introduce the tool belt to players. It gave a reward of 500 experience, making it one of the biggest rewards for a beginner task.
 * If your character has the requirements to catch fish barehanded, you will do so instead of using your tool for catching the fish.
 * In the quest Lost City you couldn't take hatchets to Entrana, but now with the tool belt you can equip it and board the ship. This saves you from having to attack zombies in the Entrana Dungeon for a hatchet. Jagex are yet to comment if this was intentional.
 * With the addition of the tool belt, many inventory space saver items became much less useful, for example the dwarven army axe and the quest kit . However, they have stronger tools (better metal hatchets/pickaxes).
 * A hammer stored on a tool belt can be used to open the Bandos door in the God Wars Dungeon.
 * When equipping the spade to the tool belt, you get a message stating that it will be used for farming and not activities like Treasure Trails or Barrows. The exception to this is the Mole Lair, which has a left-click option allowing players to gain access.