Codex Browser Use hangs during setupAtlasRuntime when nodeRepl.fetch to /backend-api/me stalls
Open 💬 0 comments Opened May 18, 2026 by Deancup
What version of the Codex App are you using (From “About Codex” dialog)?
install in may, codex app have ho about codex dialog
What subscription do you have?
plus
What platform is your computer?
Microsoft Windows NT 10.0.22631.0 x64
What issue are you seeing?
Environment:
- Codex Desktop on Windows
- Browser Use enabled
- Chrome extension connected, version v1.1.4
- System proxy required: 127.0.0.1:10800
- Localhost / 127.0.0.1 bypassed in Windows proxy settings
Symptoms:
- In-app Browser / Chrome plugin cannot open https://example.com
- Codex retries reconnecting 2/5 through 5/5
- setupAtlasRuntime({ globals: globalThis }) does not resolve after 120s
- browser-client.mjs imports successfully
- setupAtlasRuntime export exists
- IAB backend appears alive
- Codex eventually falls back to Start-Process URL, which opens the system browser but does not give Codex browser control
Observed technical detail:
- nodeRepl.fetch internal fetch bridge appears to hang on /backend-api/me
- requestMeta contains the relevant ambient network switch, but the object is not extensible, so it cannot be patched from user code
- Because setupAtlasRuntime waits synchronously for ambient network initialization, agent.browsers.list() and agent.browsers.get("iab") are never reachable
Expected:
- setupAtlasRuntime should not hang indefinitely when /backend-api/me or ambient network initialization stalls
- ambient network initialization should be timeout-bounded
- Browser client should degrade gracefully, skip ambient network if unavailable, or return a structured error
Actual:
- Browser runtime initialization hangs until external timeout
- Browser Use and Chrome extension flows both time out
What steps can reproduce the bug?
use any method to use codex broswer in codex
What is the expected behavior?
_No response_
Additional information
_No response_