›_ Codex Issues
Codex Issues / #10996

Codex app crashes on macOS shortly after launch

Resolved 💬 13 comments Opened Feb 7, 2026 by jorgengk Closed Feb 12, 2026
💡 Likely answer: A maintainer (etraut-openai, contributor) responded on this thread — see the highlighted reply below.

What version of the Codex App are you using (From “About Codex” dialog)?

Versjon 260206.1448 (565)

What subscription do you have?

Pro

What issue are you seeing?

The Codex desktop app consistently crashes on macOS approximately 30-60 seconds after launch. The crash occurs regardless of whether the app is idle or actively used.

Reinstalling the application and restarting the machine did not resolve the issue. No crash dialog. The issue occoured after the latest update

What steps can reproduce the bug?

Install Codex desktop app on macOS

Launch the application

Wait ~30 seconds

App crashes (with or without user interaction)

What is the expected behavior?

Expected Behavior
The app should remain stable after launch.

Additional information

_No response_

View original on GitHub ↗

13 Comments

etraut-openai contributor · 5 months ago

Could you provide more details about what you see when it crashes? Do you receive any dialog box? Any stack crawl?

I wonder if there's some corrupt state in your ~/.codex directory that's causing this. You could try deleting (or temporarily renaming) that directory to see if it resolves the problem.

v3i1y · 5 months ago

I am having the same issue, CLI seems fine, but app enters a crash loop.

v3i1y · 5 months ago

I tried to clear ~/.codex, it happens the same

v3i1y · 5 months ago

I think it might have something to do with the size of the repo. When I remove the largest repo from the app, everything works fine. When I add that repo, the memory usage skyrocket and then the app crashes. Is the app trying to load things to the memory that's causing the issue?

v3i1y · 5 months ago

https://github.com/user-attachments/assets/d8e230e8-da6e-416c-bff4-5e957283da03
this is a recording of what the crash loop looks like on my machine

v3i1y · 5 months ago

Hey, I got some logs too, looks like it's indeed OOM kill

Launching app {
  buildFlavor: 'prod',
  nodeEnv: undefined,
  enableSparkle: true,
  allowDevtools: false,
  allowInspectElement: false,
  allowDebugMenu: false,
  platform: 'darwin',
  packaged: true
}
[sparkle] Sparkle init begin { platform: 'darwin', packaged: true }
[sparkle] Sparkle initializing with feed https://persistent.oaistatic.com/codex-app-prod/appcast.xml
[sparkle] Sparkle scheduling interval (ms) 900000
[sparkle] Sparkle updater ready for manual checks.
[sparkle] Sparkle updater initialized.
[81143:0207/100102.728221:WARNING:content/browser/btm/btm_database.cc:128] Failed to initialize the DIPS SQLite database.
(node:81143) [DEP0169] DeprecationWarning: `url.parse()` behavior is not standardized and prone to errors that have security implications. Use the WHATWG URL API instead. CVEs are not issued for `url.parse()` vulnerabilities.
(Use `Codex --trace-deprecation ...` to show where the warning was created)
[81143:0207/100106.699944:INFO:CONSOLE:176] "  WARN  [Statsig] useGateValue hook failed to find a valid StatsigClient for gate 'codex-app-mini-window'.", source: app://-/assets/index-3Lu2GYf3.js (176)
[ElectronAppServerConnection] Initializing app-server transport
[electron-message-handler] Statsig: waiting for auth context before initializing client
[ElectronAppServerConnection] Codex CLI initialized
[electron-message-handler] Received app server result: 8aa87873-c20b-481c-860f-d5e67db94466 object(keys=2)
[electron-message-handler] Received app server result: 319033fa-98e5-4552-b7a0-066a43e03766 object(keys=2)
[electron-message-handler] Received app server result: dbf13fd0-a8f6-45b0-811a-4da889321524 object(keys=2)
[electron-message-handler] Statsig: auth context ready (authMethod=chatgpt, hasUserId=false, hasAccountId=false, hasEmail=false, hasPlan=false)
[electron-message-handler] Statsig: auth context ready (authMethod=chatgpt, hasUserId=true, hasAccountId=true, hasEmail=true, hasPlan=true)
[electron-message-handler] Statsig: client initialization completed
[electron-message-handler] Statsig: auth context ready (authMethod=chatgpt, hasUserId=true, hasAccountId=true, hasEmail=true, hasPlan=true)
[electron-message-handler] [desktop-notifications] service starting
[electron-message-handler] Handled 'ready' message, sent ide-context-updated
[electron-message-handler] Received app server result: 2a009b6f-32fa-4bce-98b9-909e107e85e6 object(keys=2)
[electron-message-handler] Skills/list request cwdsCount=1 forceReload=false
[electron-message-handler] Received app server result: eef1e7cf-365d-447d-a769-63b9b13d6477 object(keys=2)
[electron-message-handler] [desktop-notifications] service starting
[electron-message-handler] Handled 'ready' message, sent ide-context-updated
[electron-message-handler] Received app server result: 146f9529-7d38-4351-810c-934c76b3cce6 object(keys=1)
[electron-message-handler] Skills/list ok entries=1
[electron-message-handler] Received app server result: 9efba3a3-eeaf-42d0-962d-23eb695ab17c object(keys=2)
[electron-message-handler] Received app server result: c6bbe5ca-bd81-49eb-bb7b-8b4c7aac5ca0 object(keys=3)
[electron-message-handler] Received app server result: 91a11b13-f2ae-4cc3-95b4-f2308c527982 object(keys=1)
[electron-message-handler] Received app server result: dd89530b-1971-458a-a012-ab042f4f090f object(keys=3)
[electron-message-handler] Received app server result: 6473aefc-03c8-41f7-8dab-4f295cb6cbc7 object(keys=2)
[electron-message-handler] Received app server result: 7598cb56-29bb-4fb7-a044-6ab1423b23c5 object(keys=1)
[electron-message-handler] Received app server result: bcd75557-3c2b-4be7-bccc-10a4411350e4 object(keys=2)
[electron-message-handler] Received app server result: 562ebc5c-9634-4fbd-a98f-3c250ffa67c6 object(keys=2)
[electron-message-handler] Received app server result: 385ec88b-3486-4d11-a052-dc338bc86b29 object(keys=2)
[electron-message-handler] Received app server result: 6cf9646e-c1c7-4dc0-a922-d92f508652f6 object(keys=2)
[electron-message-handler] Received app server result: 7d0a977a-99ed-4d64-9ebe-f43b5c8cad3c object(keys=2)
[git-repo-watcher] Starting git repo watcher
[git-repo-watcher] Starting git repo watcher
[git-repo-watcher] Starting git repo watcher
[electron-message-handler] Received app server result: 6187e2b9-0780-46fe-889f-ef4057e2eeee object(keys=2)
[electron-message-handler] Skills/list request cwdsCount=1 forceReload=false
[git-repo-watcher] Starting git repo watcher
[electron-message-handler] Received app server result: 411d4817-eb77-4b53-90d5-8e3739607fb7 object(keys=1)
[electron-message-handler] Skills/list ok entries=1
[electron-message-handler] Received app server result: 0fc00bba-c670-47b5-9d2f-35615e744e05 object(keys=3)
[electron-message-handler] Received app server result: b4d623b4-9a87-4222-9ee4-a4bca8b49d9e object(keys=2)

<--- Last few GCs --->

[81399:0x13c00780000]    42971 ms: Mark-Compact (reduce) 3425.9 (3429.8) -> 3425.9 (3428.3) MB, pooled: 0.0 MB, 156.04 / 0.00 ms (average mu = 0.714, current mu = 0.001) last resort; GC in old space requested
[81399:0x13c00780000]    43128 ms: Mark-Compact (reduce) 3425.9 (3428.3) -> 3425.9 (3427.1) MB, pooled: 0.0 MB, 156.99 / 0.00 ms (average mu = 0.544, current mu = 0.000) last resort; GC in old space requested

[81399:0207/100145.897823:ERROR:third_party/blink/renderer/bindings/core/v8/v8_initializer.cc:920] V8 javascript OOM (CALL_AND_RETRY_LAST).
[0207/100145.902172:WARNING:third_party/crashpad/crashpad/util/process/process_memory_mac.cc:94] mach_vm_read(0x16d894000, 0x8000): (os/kern) invalid address (1)
Renderer process crashed - see https://www.electronjs.org/docs/tutorial/application-debugging for potential debugging information.
[81143:0207/100146.901071:INFO:CONSOLE:176] "  WARN  [Statsig] useGateValue hook failed to find a valid StatsigClient for gate 'codex-app-mini-window'.", source: app://-/assets/index-3Lu2GYf3.js (176)
[electron-message-handler] Statsig: waiting for auth context before initializing client
[electron-message-handler] Received app server result: 0bc5e310-6748-4a42-820d-36eeba434838 object(keys=2)
[electron-message-handler] Received app server result: a3b9c7cd-1695-4e3f-a2b9-697e7429539c object(keys=2)
[electron-message-handler] Statsig: auth context ready (authMethod=chatgpt, hasUserId=false, hasAccountId=false, hasEmail=false, hasPlan=false)
[electron-message-handler] Statsig: auth context ready (authMethod=chatgpt, hasUserId=true, hasAccountId=true, hasEmail=true, hasPlan=true)
[electron-message-handler] Received app server result: 108e940d-a200-4936-8137-9fe82dec7685 object(keys=2)
[electron-message-handler] Features enabled: enable_request_compression, collaboration_modes, personality, request_rule
[electron-message-handler] [desktop-notifications] service starting
[electron-message-handler] Handled 'ready' message, sent ide-context-updated
[electron-message-handler] Statsig: client initialization completed
[electron-message-handler] Skills/list request cwdsCount=1 forceReload=false
[electron-message-handler] Received app server result: 00ab59d4-c906-4742-8aad-4b0181fd6b06 object(keys=2)
[electron-message-handler] Received app server result: 7c2478fb-0f53-443a-b0f3-b84963c1c64c object(keys=2)
[electron-message-handler] Received app server result: 6db7a156-48bf-44c5-a479-d36b3a398b83 object(keys=1)
[electron-message-handler] Skills/list ok entries=1
[electron-message-handler] Received app server result: 7e26fb86-1377-4fda-ba09-f135dc64ccc2 object(keys=2)
[electron-message-handler] Received app server result: 715a1858-064f-47ed-93fe-bbdb4f51f6f3 object(keys=3)
[electron-message-handler] Received app server result: 995ab1fd-0da3-417f-aec6-9a883d629204 object(keys=1)
[electron-message-handler] Received app server result: 9c6f62aa-89d3-49e4-8cb8-a92e615768c2 object(keys=3)
[electron-message-handler] Received app server result: b139e4ea-1294-4e46-83a8-224c7cf97a51 object(keys=1)
[electron-message-handler] Received app server result: 664ea5f4-487b-446c-9877-c0656d8d980b object(keys=2)
[electron-message-handler] Received app server result: 51bfa166-4e55-43d7-96f0-6e07088f22f1 object(keys=2)
[electron-message-handler] Statsig: auth context ready (authMethod=chatgpt, hasUserId=true, hasAccountId=true, hasEmail=true, hasPlan=true)
[electron-message-handler] Received app server result: 2fc417c2-89c0-47ee-839b-d770501e3dc1 object(keys=2)
[electron-message-handler] Received app server result: b0a2830f-0fb0-45f7-89b6-5d3e764426e5 object(keys=2)
[electron-message-handler] Received app server result: af2b2341-aba1-418a-a9ea-92ba1cd86780 object(keys=2)
[electron-message-handler] [desktop-notifications] service starting
[electron-message-handler] Handled 'ready' message, sent ide-context-updated
[electron-message-handler] Received app server result: 47f72e5a-6e36-4294-a475-6dd33c7b1886 object(keys=2)
[electron-message-handler] [desktop-notifications] service starting
[electron-message-handler] Handled 'ready' message, sent ide-context-updated
[electron-message-handler] Received app server result: 5896a345-c506-42b2-83f5-8b2b0b616cb6 object(keys=2)

<--- Last few GCs --->

[84079:0x124007a0000]    26043 ms: Mark-Compact (reduce) 3426.8 (3431.6) -> 3426.8 (3429.8) MB, pooled: 0.0 MB, 159.22 / 0.00 ms (average mu = 0.723, current mu = 0.001) last resort; GC in old space requested
[84079:0x124007a0000]    26204 ms: Mark-Compact (reduce) 3426.8 (3429.8) -> 3426.8 (3428.3) MB, pooled: 0.0 MB, 160.13 / 0.00 ms (average mu = 0.554, current mu = 0.000) last resort; GC in old space requested

[84079:0207/100212.968070:ERROR:third_party/blink/renderer/bindings/core/v8/v8_initializer.cc:920] V8 javascript OOM (CALL_AND_RETRY_LAST).
[0207/100212.968700:WARNING:third_party/crashpad/crashpad/util/process/process_memory_mac.cc:94] mach_vm_read(0x16fc70000, 0x8000): (os/kern) invalid address (1)
Renderer process crashed - see https://www.electronjs.org/docs/tutorial/application-debugging for potential debugging information.
[81143:0207/100213.969520:INFO:CONSOLE:176] "  WARN  [Statsig] useGateValue hook failed to find a valid StatsigClient for gate 'codex-app-mini-window'.", source: app://-/assets/index-3Lu2GYf3.js (176)
[electron-message-handler] Statsig: waiting for auth context before initializing client
[electron-message-handler] Received app server result: a4dc065e-fb9f-4dba-a98c-919f3ca1a781 object(keys=2)
[electron-message-handler] Received app server result: 46d44e61-976a-44c7-8f83-001db661fa7a object(keys=2)
[electron-message-handler] Statsig: auth context ready (authMethod=chatgpt, hasUserId=false, hasAccountId=false, hasEmail=false, hasPlan=false)
[electron-message-handler] Statsig: auth context ready (authMethod=chatgpt, hasUserId=true, hasAccountId=true, hasEmail=true, hasPlan=true)
[electron-message-handler] Received app server result: 7787fc9f-2da3-4fba-83da-86c654827254 object(keys=2)
[electron-message-handler] Features enabled: enable_request_compression, collaboration_modes, personality, request_rule
[electron-message-handler] [desktop-notifications] service starting
[electron-message-handler] Handled 'ready' message, sent ide-context-updated
[electron-message-handler] Statsig: client initialization completed
[electron-message-handler] Received app server result: f279ebde-090e-449c-8185-348df73a5ee1 object(keys=2)
[electron-message-handler] Skills/list request cwdsCount=1 forceReload=false
[electron-message-handler] Received app server result: 93e339ca-e989-4f9b-b5bf-342f1609cf38 object(keys=2)
[electron-message-handler] Received app server result: a78a39d4-f59b-4816-a952-63a7e950acb5 object(keys=1)
[electron-message-handler] Skills/list ok entries=1
[electron-message-handler] Received app server result: 4c1f60f3-f72c-41b5-9050-e455404ab10a object(keys=2)
[electron-message-handler] Received app server result: aa3d3640-f097-421f-8b02-e87db58a038d object(keys=3)
[electron-message-handler] Received app server result: dc91aa3a-5287-4bdc-bad5-3a4db8b6fa27 object(keys=1)
[electron-message-handler] Received app server result: 7a244205-0aaa-41d7-8fe1-8dd55a79c8c7 object(keys=3)
[electron-message-handler] Received app server result: d82da5c8-0e00-4aca-89be-ea3be8ef8c37 object(keys=1)
[electron-message-handler] Received app server result: ee6edbd1-0159-4814-82bb-6d50f9fb09a1 object(keys=2)
[electron-message-handler] Received app server result: dc467983-c088-4140-b686-0a4af5bf0571 object(keys=2)
[electron-message-handler] Statsig: auth context ready (authMethod=chatgpt, hasUserId=true, hasAccountId=true, hasEmail=true, hasPlan=true)
[electron-message-handler] Received app server result: 80f60e08-ec5d-4b79-b672-2772f34930c0 object(keys=2)
[electron-message-handler] Received app server result: b95e0714-ac0d-45bc-a42e-14235db06569 object(keys=2)
[electron-message-handler] Received app server result: 2f8cf7a8-b1f6-4aa9-818f-b860fa38ec70 object(keys=2)
[electron-message-handler] [desktop-notifications] service starting
[electron-message-handler] Handled 'ready' message, sent ide-context-updated
[electron-message-handler] Received app server result: 31f90932-7ca4-4f04-8ad4-c6a28c0ae0c3 object(keys=2)
[electron-message-handler] [desktop-notifications] service starting
[electron-message-handler] Handled 'ready' message, sent ide-context-updated
[electron-message-handler] Received app server result: e3c86649-e845-485f-b415-d3e0936ecf77 object(keys=2)
jorgengk · 5 months ago
Could you provide more details about what you see when it crashes? Do you receive any dialog box? Any stack crawl? I wonder if there's some corrupt state in your ~/.codex directory that's causing this. You could try deleting (or temporarily renaming) that directory to see if it resolves the problem.

When the crash occurs, the entire app process exits abruptly after ~30 seconds.
There is no dialog box, no warning, and nothing visible in the UI beforehand.
From a user perspective it looks like a silent process termination.

So far I have observed:

No crash dialog from macOS

No visible stack trace or error message

App functions normally until it suddenly closes

I have already tried:

Reinstalling the app

Restarting the machine

I will try deleting or temporarily renaming the ~/.codex directory next and report back whether that changes the behavior.

jorgengk · 5 months ago

Update: regression after update — crash triggered by adding large workspace

This appears to be a regression after a Codex Desktop update.

The same workspace worked fine previously, but after updating the Codex Desktop app, adding this workspace now consistently causes the app to exit silently after ~30–60 seconds.

Symptom

Codex Desktop launches normally.

After adding a specific workspace, the app closes abruptly after ~30–60 seconds.

No macOS crash dialog, no visible error message.

The app can be idle or active — the shutdown is time-based.

Codex CLI / terminal usage works fine.

Reproduction

Launch Codex Desktop.

Add the workspace.

Wait ~30–60 seconds.

Codex Desktop exits silently.

Removing the workspace prevents the crash.

What changed

This workspace worked correctly before the update.

The crash and heavy lag only started after updating Codex Desktop.

Findings from log + filesystem inspection (sanitized)

A Crashpad minidump is created at crash time, e.g.:

<HOME>/Library/Application Support/Codex/Crashpad/completed/<UUID>.dmp

No corresponding entry in:

<HOME>/Library/Logs/DiagnosticReports/

Codex app logs end abruptly without a clear fatal error:

<HOME>/Library/Logs/com.openai.codex/<DATE>/*.log

The workspace contains a very large data directory (~16 GB) with many large files (including large .ifc files).

After the update, Codex Desktop appears to scan/index/watch the workspace more aggressively.

Moving the large data directory completely outside the workspace root makes Codex Desktop stable again.

Even when stable, the app is significantly more laggy than before the update.

Confirmed workaround

Moving the large data directory out of the workspace → crash stops.

Re-adding it → crash returns.

This strongly suggests a workspace scanning / indexing / memory regression in the desktop app.

Secondary signals (may be unrelated)

Repeated ENOENT errors from stale workspace paths.

spawn gh ENOENT (GitHub CLI not installed) in breadcrumbs.

Questions

Is there a supported way to exclude directories from desktop indexing (ignore file or config)?

Is the desktop app expected to handle very large non-code data directories inside a workspace?

jorgengk · 5 months ago

<img width="505" height="819" alt="Image" src="https://github.com/user-attachments/assets/ffd269ea-a4e8-48a1-a3e3-350e56572533" />

So, i've made a suboptimal workaround that in the end provoked the crash again. I removed the ProgramData folder (large file 18GB) out of the workspace folder, then startet the codex app, it was running, then moved the ProgramData back into the folder, it worked "fine" if you dont mind the lag, but then i pushed the diff-panel button, and the app crashed again.

Yydc · 5 months ago

same issue here

yilibinbin · 5 months ago

same issue here

Sammy93 · 5 months ago

same here, I remove the large workspace, then added it again and it stopped crashing

etraut-openai contributor · 5 months ago

We think this issue has been fixed in the latest release. There might be additional problems that have similar symptoms. I'm going to close and lock this issue. If you are seeing similar behaviors with the latest release, please open a new issue and provide details.