Codex Desktop UI overlay / washed-out layer on macOS Intel

Codex Desktop UI overlay / washed-out layer on macOS Intel

Summary

Codex Desktop on macOS shows a persistent translucent white overlay / washed-out layer on the home screen composer area. The input box remains visible, but the region below it looks covered by a semi-transparent white panel or stale overlay. The issue persists after cache resets, preference resets, GPU-disable launch flags, and a full local state reset.

Environment

• App: Codex Desktop
• Bundle ID: com.openai.codex
• Version: 26.506.31421
• Bundle version: 2620
• OS: macOS 15.7.5 (24G624)
• Architecture: x86_64
• Machine graphics:
• Intel UHD Graphics 630, Metal 3
• Radeon Pro 555X, Metal 2
• Automatic graphics switching supported
• pmset gpuswitch: 2 (automatic graphics switching)
• Locale/UI language: Chinese

What happens

On the Codex Desktop start/home screen, the lower part of the composer and the content underneath it appear to be covered by a white translucent overlay or stale fade layer. The visible result looks like:

• Composer/input area is still interactable and visible.
• A large white/foggy panel appears below the composer.
• Underlying UI/list content is washed out or nearly invisible.
• The issue appears on an empty project workspace, but it looks like an app shell / desktop UI rendering issue rather than a project-specific issue.

Expected behavior

The home screen and composer should render without the extra translucent overlay. Content below the composer should be normally visible.

Reproduction notes

1. Open Codex Desktop.
2. Open or create an empty local project folder.
3. Observe the home/start screen with the prompt "要在 New project 中构建什么？".
4. The area below the composer appears covered by a persistent white overlay.

Things already tried

• Quit and reopen Codex.
• Resize the window / toggle fullscreen.
• Refresh the UI.
• Switch light/dark mode.
• Test display-related changes.
• Confirmed the project folder is empty except for .git, so this is not caused by project code.
• Moved/cleared Electron cache and render caches:
• ~/Library/Application Support/Codex/GPUCache
• ~/Library/Application Support/Codex/DawnGraphiteCache
• ~/Library/Application Support/Codex/DawnWebGPUCache
• ~/Library/Application Support/Codex/Code Cache
• ~/Library/Application Support/Codex/Cache
• Reset preferences:
• ~/Library/Preferences/com.openai.codex.plist
• Cleared additional system caches:
• ~/Library/Caches/com.openai.codex
• ~/Library/HTTPStorages/com.openai.codex
• ~/Library/HTTPStorages/com.openai.codex.binarycookies
• Tried launching with GPU/Metal-related flags:
• --disable-gpu
• --disable-gpu-compositing
• --disable-accelerated-2d-canvas
• --disable-features=Metal,CanvasOopRasterization,UseSkiaRenderer
• ELECTRON_DISABLE_GPU=1
• LIBGL_ALWAYS_SOFTWARE=1
• Enabled macOS Reduce Transparency:
• defaults write -g AppleReduceTransparency -bool true
• Performed a full local Codex state reset.

Logs

~/Library/Logs/com.openai.codex exists, but no useful log output was visible during inspection.

Extra investigation

The app resources include frontend chunks in app.asar. One suspicious area is the composer overlay / scroll reserve code, especially:

• right-panel-composer-overlay-scroll-reserve-DAyqDzTM.js
• CSS references to right-panel-composer-overlay
• CSS references to app-shell-main-content-top-fade

I briefly tested a local patch changing the overlay reserve height from 118 to 0, but it did not resolve the issue and the app bundle was restored from backup afterward.

Attachments

Please attach the screenshot showing the white translucent overlay below the composer.

<img width="1810" height="1074" alt="Image" src="https://github.com/user-attachments/assets/d60b5fcb-af0e-457f-92d0-21a5797d5be0" />

<img width="1706" height="1362" alt="Image" src="https://github.com/user-attachments/assets/ac984848-3c7f-49f3-8466-adfb3968e16e" />