Codex Desktop reconnect loop on new/restarted conversations due to turn/started for unknown conversation

Summary

Codex Desktop consistently enters a reconnect loop when I:

• start a new conversation
• restart an old conversation

This is reproducible on every attempt in the desktop app.

The issue does not appear to be caused by my VPN or local cache state. I reset the relevant local storage areas and the behavior remained unchanged.

Environment

• Product: Codex Desktop
• Date observed: May 5, 2026
• OS: macOS
• App version seen in session metadata: 0.128.0-alpha.1

Reproduction

1. Open Codex Desktop
2. Start a new conversation
3. Or restart an old conversation
4. Observe repeated Reconnecting... retries
5. Eventually it may recover, but the reconnect loop happens first

Expected behavior

New conversations and restarted conversations should start normally without reconnect loops.

Actual behavior

The app shows repeated reconnect attempts specifically at conversation start / restart time.

Key log evidence

In the desktop logs, the pattern is:

1. browser sidebar thread is registered with conversationId=new-conversation
2. browser-use is force-installed at runtime
3. the conversation is created successfully
4. turn/start is routed successfully for the expected conversation
5. immediately after that, the app logs:

Received turn/started for unknown conversation

This strongly suggests a conversation routing bug inside the desktop app.

Example reproduction after local reset

Log file:

/Users/qinggang/Library/Logs/com.openai.codex/2026/05/05/codex-desktop-cc899bf8-644a-44ab-8b1f-e69327433dde-53115-t0-i1-101625-0.log

Relevant sequence from that log:

• registered browser sidebar thread conversationId=new-conversation
• forceInstallPluginNames=["browser-use"]
• bundled_plugin_install_requested pluginName=browser-use reason=forced
• Conversation created conversationId=019df7a3-a20a-7671-8c71-af4fafb29e9c
• normal turn/start
• captured turn route conversationId=019df7a3-a20a-7671-8c71-af4fafb29e9c
• then:

Received turn/started for unknown conversation conversationId=019df7a3-b244-7f80-8d4d-5de2d6ed71b1

Earlier matching reproductions

Same pattern was also seen for these conversations:

• 019df631-720c-7ba3-9a40-0849d27bbd9b
• 019df78a-be9e-7e12-8125-5788c03e7a9b

What I already tried

I ruled out local state corruption by resetting these areas:

• main app Session Storage
• main app SharedStorage
• browser partition Partitions/codex-browser-app

I also set this in ~/.codex/config.toml:

[plugins."browser-use@openai-bundled"]
enabled = false

[codex-desktop-reconnect-findings-2026-05-05.md](https://github.com/user-attachments/files/27395651/codex-desktop-reconnect-findings-2026-05-05.md)