Codex Desktop closes immediately after launch on Windows

Potential duplicates detected. Please review them and close your issue if it is a duplicate.

• #16269
• #15179

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I posted in a related issue that it had something to do with my git repo. In my case I wasn't really using git so I just deleted the .git folder and Codex started working again.

Another detailed datapoint on this from a different Windows machine. This looks close to #16502, and it may also overlap with #16834 because I see MCP -32601 warnings during startup, but I have not proven those warnings are the root cause.

Environment

• Windows 11 Pro 10.0.26200 x64
• Store package: OpenAI.Codex_26.325.3894.0_x64__2p2nqsd0c76g0
• App-server logs identify the desktop client as app_server.client_version="26.325.31654"

Clean repro

I can reproduce this from a clean launch with no interaction:

1. Kill any existing WindowsApps Codex processes.
2. Launch with:

``powershell
Start-Process explorer.exe 'shell:AppsFolder\\OpenAI.Codex_2p2nqsd0c76g0!App'
``

1. Do nothing.
2. The process tree reaches 6 Codex processes and one real window.
3. Around 54-55 seconds later it drops to 1 process, then 0, and the window disappears.

I reproduced this twice today. One run exited at about 46 seconds; the clean rerun exited at about 55 seconds.

What Windows reports

• App activation succeeds normally. The only matching TWinUI event I found is:
• Microsoft-Windows-TWinUI/Operational
• Event ID 1621
• Activation of app OpenAI.Codex_2p2nqsd0c76g0!App attempted ... The operation completed successfully.
• During the failing repro window I did not get a Codex-specific:
• Application Error
• Windows Error Reporting
• WER crash bucket / report archive entry

So on this machine it does not look like a normal native faulting-module crash. It looks more like a controlled teardown / lifecycle exit after startup.

Last strong internal signals before exit

From C:\Users\T-GAMER\\.codex\\logs_1.sqlite, for the packaged desktop app-server process (...\\app\\resources\\codex.exe app-server), the last notable signals before teardown were:

startup remote plugin sync failed ... https://chatgpt.com/backend-api/plugins/list ... 403 Forbidden
failed to warm featured plugin ids cache ... https://chatgpt.com/backend-api/plugins/featured ... 403 Forbidden
Failed to list resource templates for MCP server 'openaiDeveloperDocs': Mcp error: -32601: Method not found
Failed to list resources for MCP server 'openaiDeveloperDocs': Mcp error: -32601: Method not found
Failed to list resource templates for MCP server 'vercel': Mcp error: -32601: Method not found
Failed to list resources for MCP server 'vercel': Mcp error: -32601: Method not found
app-server event: app/list/updated targeted_connections=0
serve_inner: serve finished quit_reason=Cancelled

Important caveat: I am not claiming the 403 plugin sync or MCP Method not found warnings are definitely the root cause. I am only reporting that they are the last strong app-internal signals I could correlate before the process tree disappears.

Control case: direct binary launch stays alive

If I launch the binary directly instead of going through the packaged AppX entry, it stays up and behaves normally for at least 2+ minutes:

& "C:\Program Files\WindowsApps\OpenAI.Codex_26.325.3894.0_x64__2p2nqsd0c76g0\app\Codex.exe" \
  --enable-logging=file \
  --log-file=C:\path\to\codex_desktop_direct_launch.log \
  --v=1

In that direct-launch mode:

• the process tree remains alive
• the window stays open
• Electron verbose networking continues normally
• I do not see the same immediate self-exit behavior

That makes me suspect the failure is specific to the packaged Windows Store / AppX launch/lifecycle path rather than the Codex.exe binary itself.

Older history on this machine

Reliability Monitor on this same machine also contains older Codex hangs:

• 2026-03-10: Codex.exe version 908.0.0.0, Application Hang (1002)
• 2026-03-13: Codex.exe version 993.0.0.0, Application Hang (1002)

Those are not the same repro as today, but they may indicate a broader Windows desktop stability problem in this line of builds.

If useful, I can also provide the exact PowerShell polling loop I used to time the exit and the exact sqlite query I used to isolate the app-server log rows.

Possible related issue: #16834.

On my machine, the packaged Windows desktop app also emits MCP -32601 Method not found warnings during startup (openaiDeveloperDocs, vercel) before the app tears itself down around 46-55 seconds after launch. I also see startup-time 403 Forbidden responses on plugins/list and plugins/featured.

I have not proven those warnings are the root cause here, but there is enough overlap that these may be the same startup/lifecycle bug or two adjacent failure modes in the same path.

I also encountered automatic exit without any valid information. But after reinstalling, it can run stably for a period of time, but once I exit, it will automatically exit, and I can only continue reinstalling

"If I launch the binary directly instead of going through the packaged AppX entry, it stays up and behaves normally for at least 2+ minutes: & "C:\Program Files\WindowsApps\OpenAI.Codex_26.325.3894.0_x64__2p2nqsd0c76g0\app\Codex.exe" \ 2"

that solved it for me. It ran all day without closing. Just started it from that exe via double click. I hate Windows Store apps btw.
I have certain things concerning windows update blocked in my firewall, that maybe the issue. But looking at the issues here, it probably wasn't.