The bottom-line case for adopting no-first-use policies or their sole-purpose functional equivalents is not that they will, by themselves, bring an end to the terrible existential risk to life on this planet that will continue so long as any nuclear weapons remain. It is that they are an extremely important contributor to immediate nuclear risk reduction, to the necessary ongoing progress of delegitimising nuclear weapons in policymakers’ thinking, and to maintaining a global commitment to non-proliferation.