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Codex Issues / #19239

Codex desktop UI does not update language despite localeOverride=zh-CN and --lang=zh-CN

Open 💬 10 comments Opened Apr 24, 2026 by SeanSeanSo
💡 Likely answer: A maintainer (github-actions[bot], contributor) responded on this thread — see the highlighted reply below.

Summary

Codex Desktop does not update the app UI language according to the language selected in Settings.

The local setting is saved as localeOverride=zh-CN, and the running Electron renderer process is launched with --lang=zh-CN, but the visible UI remains in English after restart.

Environment

  • Codex Desktop: 26.422.21459
  • Codex CLI: 0.124.0-alpha.2
  • macOS: 26.4.1, build 25E253
  • Architecture: arm64
  • Selected language: Simplified Chinese / zh-CN

What I checked

  • The local global state contains localeOverride: "zh-CN".
  • The running Codex renderer process includes --lang=zh-CN.
  • The app bundle contains Simplified Chinese resources, including frontend strings such as “新聊天” and “Codex 设置”.
  • Restarting Codex does not change the UI language.

Suspected cause

From the bundled frontend code, UI message loading appears to be gated behind a remote feature flag named enable_i18n. If that flag is false or not fetched for this machine/account, the app still computes the preferred locale but does not pass localized messages to the UI, so it falls back to English defaults.

This would also explain why the issue only reproduces on some machines/accounts.

Expected behavior

When the user selects Simplified Chinese in Settings, Codex Desktop should render the UI in Chinese after restart or reload.

Actual behavior

The UI remains in English even though the saved setting and Electron language are both zh-CN.

View original on GitHub ↗

10 Comments

github-actions[bot] contributor · 2 months ago

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

  • #18456

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zhaomenghua · 2 months ago

I can also reproduce this in Codex Desktop.

Observed behavior:

  • Settings > Language shows 中文（中国） selected.
  • The setting label itself says this is the language for the app UI.
  • After fully quitting and restarting Codex, the visible app UI remains English, including settings labels such as Default open destination, Language, Prevent sleep while running, etc.
  • Chat responses can be Chinese, but the Codex application shell UI does not switch to Chinese.

This appears to match the original report: the language selection is saved/visible in Settings, but localized UI strings are not applied after restart.

hanhongfei558 · 2 months ago

macos 26.4 系统下，遇到过同样问题，最后发现彻底关闭Codex APP，然后开启系统全局代理，然后再打开Codex APP之后重新切换语言就有效了。原因应该是加载语言需要联网。

lyglane · 2 months ago

我也遇到了同样的问题。设置里选了中文但菜单还是英文。Codex Desktop 版本：26.513.31313 (2867)。请帮忙处理。

xiaoqiangit · 2 months ago
我也遇到了同样的问题。设置里选了中文但菜单还是英文。Codex Desktop版本：26.513.31313 (2867)。请帮忙处理。

找到了一个解决方法：

  • 退出应用（重要）
  • 打开 "~/.codex/.codex-global-state.json"
  • 把 "localeOverride" 设置改成 "en-US"，然后保存
  • 重新打开应用
958272629-collab · 2 months ago

I can reproduce this as well in Codex Desktop.

Observed behavior:

  • Settings > General > Language shows 中文（中国） selected.
  • The setting description says Language for the app UI.
  • The visible UI remains English, including the left settings sidebar (General, Appearance, Configuration, Personalization, MCP servers, etc.) and General settings labels such as Default open destination, Language, Show in menu bar, and Prevent sleep while running.
  • This matches the original report: the language selection is saved and displayed, but localized UI strings are not applied.

This is still reproducible as of 2026-05-18.

jmio19930215 · 1 month ago

I’m seeing the same issue on Windows.

Environment:

  • Codex Desktop: 26.513.40821
  • Build flavor: Windows Store
  • OS: Windows
  • System locale/timezone: zh-CN / Asia-Shanghai
  • Selected app UI language: 中文（中国）

What happens:

  • Settings > General > Language is set to 中文（中国）
  • I fully restarted Codex after changing the language
  • The UI still remains in English, including Settings, sidebar items like “New chat / Search / Skills / Project”, and the top menu “File / Edit / View / Window / Help”

Expected:

  • After selecting 中文（中国） and restarting the app, the Codex Desktop UI should render in Simplified Chinese.

This looks consistent with the original report: the language setting is saved, but the localized UI strings are not being applied.

wyeee1 · 1 month ago

Windows 版 26.527.31326，localeOverride = zh-CN 已保存，但主界面仍英文。

liuqiangweb-svg · 1 month ago

Adding another reproduction from macOS with Simplified Chinese.

Environment

  • Codex Desktop: 26.609.30741
  • macOS: 15.3.2, build 24D81
  • Platform: macOS
  • Selected language: Simplified Chinese / zh-CN (中文（中国）)

What was tried

  • Changed Settings -> General -> Language to 中文（中国）
  • Went back to the app
  • Restarted Codex
  • Switched language away and back to 中文（中国）

Actual behavior

The language selector shows 中文（中国）, but the app UI remains in English. In the captured Settings screen, these labels are still English after the language is set to Chinese:

  • General
  • Work mode
  • Permissions
  • Default permissions
  • Auto-review
  • Full access
  • Default open destination
  • Language

Expected behavior

The desktop UI should switch to Simplified Chinese after selecting 中文（中国） and restarting the app.

derekNeedCoffee · 1 month ago

Adding a summary from several reproductions:

  • Users are still reproducing this on recent Desktop builds, including 26.609.30741.
  • localeOverride is saved as zh-CN.
  • The renderer appears to start with --lang=zh-CN.
  • Simplified Chinese resources exist in the app bundle.
  • Chat responses can be Chinese, but the Desktop UI still remains English or mixed English.

One reported workaround was to fully quit Codex, enable a system-wide proxy before launching, then switch the language again. That suggests this may involve startup-time fetching of remote i18n config, feature flags, or server-side rollout state.

Could maintainers confirm whether Desktop UI localization is gated by a remote enable_i18n flag or another server-side config?

If the Desktop UI i18n code is not part of this public repo, an external PR may not be able to fix it. In that case, please route this to the internal Desktop/i18n config owner.