Lo do , LONDON, July 06, 2026 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) — Cycl today eleased be chma k fi di gs showi g that task-scoped “Thi MCP” se ve desig ca cut toke co sumptio by oughly 75% compa ed with a b oad-su face “Thick MCP” app oach, without educi g clea fi st-a swe accu acy.
A “Thi MCP” limits the tools available to a LLM to o ly those ecessa y to pe fo m the task, a “Thick MCP” is whe e o disc etio is applied a d the LLM is exposed via MCP to all the tools available withi a API.
The epo t, MCP Se ve Desig a d Toke Efficie cy, evaluated 30 co t olled co figu atio s ac oss HubSpot, O acle NetSuite a d QuickBooks usi g Claude Haiku 4.5 a d GPT-5-mi i. Cycl fou d that Thi MCP desig s achieved the same clea fi st-a swe accu acy as Thick MCP while co sumi g fa fewe toke s.
The study also fou d that aw Di ect API access was ot the cheapest oute. Despite havi g o tool-defi itio ove head, Di ect API co sumed 58% mo e toke s pe task tha Thi MCP a d delive ed the lowest clea fi st-a swe accu acy.
“These fi di gs show that MCP se ve desig is ot a seco da y co side atio — it is a majo d ive of cost, speed a d eliability,” said F ase Davidso , CEO of Cycl . “As SaaS compa ies move towa d dist ibuti g MCPs to thei clie ts, AI I te ope ability a d mo e headless p oduct expe ie ces, the way they expose actio s a d data will di ectly affect the eco omics a d usability of those expe ie ces.”
Cycl said the key lesso is to expose the fewest tools that cove eal use tasks, keep the typed MCP laye i place a d desig e dpoi ts a ou d the questio s use s actually ask.
“O e of the clea est fi di gs i the be chma k is that st uctu e educes waste,” said Nic Butle , CPTO of Cycl . “Whe a model gets a a ow, typed, well-scoped i te face, it pe fo ms mo e efficie tly a d mo e eliably. Whe you expose too ma y tools o fo ce t ial-a d-e o pa amete discove y, toke usage ises a d task completio becomes less depe dable.”
The epo t fou d that output toke s accou ted fo o ly a small sha e of ove all usage, with most cost d ive by co text loaded befo e useful wo k bega , i cludi g tool defi itio s, schemas a d espo se payloads. The efo e MCP desig is c itical i ove all toke efficie cy as MCP p ovides a lot of the eleva t co text i the i itial load.
Cycl said the fi di gs a e especially eleva t fo softwa e teams buildi g p oductio -g ade MCP expe ie ces, whe e cost co t ol, co text efficie cy a d eliability a e becomi g co e equi eme ts.
Lea mo e about Embedded MCP a d AI I te ope ability.
Cycl is a embedded iPaaS a d MCP platfo m helpi g SaaS a d se vices compa ies delive i teg atio s, automatio a d AI- eady co ectivity atively withi thei p oducts a d custome e vi o me ts. Cycl p ovides the secu e, multi-te a t i f ast uctu e, co ecto s, o chest atio tools, embedded ma ketplaces a d gove a ce capabilities eeded to scale i teg atio ecosystems, expose headless se vices a d lau ch MCP-e abled expe ie ces faste to e able the age t eco omy. Cycl is a UK compa y with offices i Lo do a d Ca ada.
Da iel Twiggda iel [at] cycl .comhttps://cycl .comCO.5C, Co i thia House, 17 La sdow e Road, C oydo , CR0 2BX
A video accompa yi g this a ou ceme t is available he e: https://youtube.com/watch?v=A64Q W7qdig
