Notion connector tools remain 401 after reconnect in Codex desktop

Open 💬 4 comments Opened May 28, 2026 by Nomia

Summary

The Codex desktop app can discover Notion connector tools after reinstall/reconnect, but the tools still fail with 401 Reauthentication required. The UI does not make it clear whether Notion is installed, authenticated, enabled as an MCP server, or only available as a plugin connector.

Environment

  • Codex desktop app on macOS
  • Date observed: 2026-05-28
  • Notion plugin/connector was uninstalled, reinstalled, and reconnected by the user
  • Screenshot state: notion appears under "From plugins", while the main MCP server list only shows node_repl and playwright

Expected behavior

After reconnecting / reauthorizing Notion, the current Codex session should be able to use the Notion tools to fetch and update pages.

Actual behavior

Tool discovery exposes Notion tools under:

mcp__codex_apps__notion

But fetching a Notion page still fails:

401: "Server returned 401: 'Reauthentication required'"

The older mcp__notion__ namespace is no longer usable in this session:

unsupported call: mcp__notion__notion_fetch

Steps tried

  1. Uninstalled the Notion MCP/plugin from Codex settings.
  2. Reinstalled / reconnected Notion.
  3. Retried tool discovery.
  4. Retried mcp__codex_apps__notion._fetch against a Notion page URL.
  5. Still received 401 Reauthentication required.

Impact

  • Codex can discover Notion tools but cannot actually read or write Notion pages.
  • Reinstalling/reconnecting Notion does not appear to refresh the connector auth state available to the current Codex runtime.
  • The UI does not clearly distinguish:
  • installed plugin
  • connected OAuth account
  • active MCP server
  • connector requiring reauthentication

Requested improvements

  • Refresh Notion connector authentication after reconnect/reinstall so the current Codex session can use the tools.
  • Surface explicit status in the MCP/plugin UI: connected, needs auth, enabled as MCP, installed as plugin only, etc.
  • Provide a way to force-refresh connector auth for the current session without guessing whether a Codex restart is required.
  • If a connector is discovered but unusable due to auth, show that status in tool discovery or the tool error with a user-actionable remediation.

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