Prompt permanently stuck on "Thinking", even after pressing stop and restarting the Codex app
What version of the Codex App are you using (From “About Codex” dialog)?
26.306.11636
What subscription do you have?
Plus
What platform is your computer?
Windows 10, fully patched
What issue are you seeing?
I had codex windows app rewrite some server code which was already in a running state, so I used a "Steer" command to tell it was already running and that I now closed it and afterwards it wrote "Good. That removes the stale-process variable while I finish the fixes. I’m completing the remaining code changes and then I’ll rerun analysis so you can restart the server against the updated logic." and a few other paragraphs and then it just got stuck with the codex.exe sandbox process frozen at 100% CPU usage.
I closed codex, killed all the processes and restarted, but the specific chat remained stuck at "thinking" with the stop button enabled. Clicking the stop button didn't do anything.
After restarting twice more with no change, I wrote "stop work" (once) as a prompt and used the "steer" button and finally the chat stopped and allowed me to write a new prompt, but for some reason my steering prompt twice:
<img width="755" height="526" alt="Image" src="https://github.com/user-attachments/assets/483e3454-e96d-48c7-a3f4-4d90cb2516d6" />
Update:
This happened again with version 26.306.11636, this time the conversation is unstoppable. Stop button does nothing, trying to steer triggers a weird flicker and does nothing. All context lost unless you somehow free it up.
Session ID : 019cc513-7b85-7762-9cbd-fd9d4a6b1916
What steps can reproduce the bug?
Intentionally have a locked file handle due to a process running in the sandbox and use a prompt that acts on that file.
What is the expected behavior?
Not freezing the sandbox process and stopping the chat automatically or when I pressed the stop button.
Additional information
Session ID:
019cc513-7b85-7762-9cbd-fd9d4a6b1916
Hopefully the session ID will give you some more insight into this.
21 Comments
Potential duplicates detected. Please review them and close your issue if it is a duplicate.
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I meet the same case yestoday and I ALSO kill it by smartly insert a steer command. this should be a bug since the stop button is not working.
come on , fix it !!!! I need codex!!!!
Yes, but sometimes sessions just die and don't restart, always "Thinking". So you waste your limits on analysis, the session crashes, and that's it, you've wasted your tokens
I posted an update:
This happened again with version 26.306.11636, this time the conversation is unstoppable. Stop button does nothing, trying to steer triggers a weird flicker and does nothing. All context lost unless you somehow free it up.
Session ID : 019cc513-7b85-7762-9cbd-fd9d4a6b1916
something so simple worked. I just steered in a STOP and it stopped. Thank you!
A fix is rolling out in pre-release now and will be fully released later today (March 11)
still not working
What version of the app/extension are you on?
0.114.0
After restarting extensions in Antigravity, an existing Codex thread got stuck on “Thinking” Reloading the extension host and reloading the window did not fix it. Starting a new chat worked, but I wanted to preserve the existing thread context.
What finally worked was switching the model in the stuck thread. after changing the model, the thread responded again and retained prior context.
This may help isolate whether the stuck state is tied to the thread stream or model session rather than the whole IDE state.
I try your way,but still stuck, and no response.
im stuck too.. this is totally ridic..
there are also problems.
When I try to steer it into a STOP I get a
Error creating taskpopupCodex CLI can work. But the app sticks in Thinking. ALL PROJECTS.
I get this too. I’ve tried different devices, different Wi-Fi networks, different accounts, and different models, and all of them get stuck on “thinking,” reducing my usage a lot without actually doing anything.
This issue happend to me it's the last week of April. Codex is working but in one specific chat it's stuck at thinking! I am not able to steer the conversation or stop it from thinking. Although other old/new chats in codex are working normally.
Unfortunately, happened several times for me as well - lost my context and had to start from scratch
I quit the Codex and restart it in terminal.
Like /Applications/Codex.app/Contents/MacOS/Codex
Then it work.
Still have this issue. I thought it was because I reached my limit, and used a reset - but I can't get it to stop "thinking". Stop button is dead, steering commands don't send, restarting app doesn't change anything, using CLI Codex doesn't reset the app either.