Codex usage limit decreases without corresponding user activity
What version of the Codex App are you using (From “About Codex” dialog)?
Version 26.611.62324
What subscription do you have?
pro 5x
What platform is your computer?
Mac OS Darwin 25.6.0 arm64 arm
What issue are you seeing?
Subject:
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<img width="1629" height="1192" alt="Image" src="https://github.com/user-attachments/assets/6d675d00-07da-42f7-aa2b-f25fbc1b8200" />
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<img width="1629" height="1192" alt="Image" src="https://github.com/user-attachments/assets/3615b4b7-113c-49dc-9f62-8ab35efc3d8b" />
Hello,
I would like to report what appears to be a bug related to Codex usage limits.
Environment:
- macOS
- Codex desktop application
- Workspace contains multiple engineering projects
- Subscription: paid plan with Codex access
Problem Summary
Codex usage limits decrease significantly even when there is little or no active usage.
I initially suspected that large project size or repository indexing might be responsible. During investigation I performed multiple isolation tests, but the issue remained.
Observed Behaviour
- Codex usage limit was exhausted unexpectedly despite normal usage.
- After limit reset, usage immediately returned to approximately 98% consumed.
- In several cases, the limit continued decreasing while:
- no prompts were being submitted;
- no active Codex tasks were running;
- Codex window was idle;
- system monitoring showed no significant Codex activity.
Investigation Performed
Phase 1 – Repository analysis
Initial workspace:
- Main folder: “New project”
- Size: approximately 7.7 GB
- File count: approximately 256,468 files
Findings:
- Root .git repository size: approximately 3.6 GB
- Repository covered all engineering projects simultaneously.
At first I suspected Codex might be scanning the entire workspace.
Phase 2 – Repository isolation
Actions performed:
- Disabled root repository:
mv .git .git_DISABLED_2026-06-18
- Created a separate repository only inside project:
New project/НТГ ОРЧ
- Initialized new local repository:
git init
- Added .gitignore
- Verified git status.
Result:
The new repository contained only the project-specific content.
However, the Codex limit issue remained.
Phase 3 – Minimal project test
Created completely separate test workspace:
~/Documents/Test_Codex
Commands executed:
mkdir ~/Documents/Test_Codex
cd ~/Documents/Test_Codex
git init
echo test > README.md
Result:
Even in a nearly empty project containing only README.md, the usage limit continued to decrease.
This suggests the problem is not caused by project size.
Phase 4 – Process monitoring
Continuous monitoring was performed using:
while true; do
date
top -l 1 -o cpu -stats pid,command,cpu,time | head -30
sleep 10
done
Observations:
- Codex processes remained almost completely idle.
- CPU usage of Codex processes was effectively 0%.
- No large indexing activity was visible.
- No runaway git processes.
- No continuous file scanning visible.
- No significant memory growth.
Relevant processes observed:
Codex
Codex (Renderer)
Codex (Service)
The processes remained present but mostly inactive.
Result:
The operating system monitoring does not indicate any workload that would explain rapid consumption of Codex limits.
Additional Observation
I observed multiple situations where:
- a session completed successfully;
- Codex was closed or left idle;
- no new requests were submitted;
yet after some time the usage limit had decreased significantly.
I also observed cases where usage dropped immediately after a reset despite almost no new activity.
Possible Cause
Based on testing, the issue appears unrelated to:
- project size;
- number of files;
- Git repository size;
- active local processing;
- active user prompts.
It may be related to:
- session accounting;
- background usage accounting;
- stale sessions remaining associated with the account;
- server-side usage calculation.
Files Available
I can provide:
- screenshots of limit behaviour;
- terminal monitoring logs;
- repository diagnostics;
- Git isolation test results.
Please investigate whether usage accounting may be incorrectly attributing consumption to inactive or previously completed Codex sessions.
Thank you.
What steps can reproduce the bug?
I cannot reliably reproduce this intentionally because the issue appears to happen while Codex is idle.
Observed sequence:
- Open Codex desktop app on macOS.
- Work in a local project.
- Stop submitting prompts.
- Confirm no Codex task is actively running.
- Leave Codex idle or close/reopen it.
- Watch the Codex usage indicator after some time.
- The remaining Codex limit decreases even though no new prompt was submitted.
Additional isolation test:
- Create a minimal empty test project.
- Run:
mkdir ~/Documents/Test_Codex
cd ~/Documents/Test_Codex
git init
echo test > README.md
- Open this folder in Codex.
- Ask one very small prompt, for example: “Reply with one word: test.”
- Stop using Codex.
- Monitor the usage limit.
- The limit still decreases over time, even though the project is minimal and no active task is running.
What is the expected behavior?
_No response_
Additional information
_No response_
7 Comments
Potential duplicates detected. Please review them and close your issue if it is a duplicate.
Powered by Codex Action
Additional evidence collected after opening this issue:
I disabled the original repository metadata and recreated a clean local Git repository for the project to rule out excessive indexing caused by a large Git history.
Before:
Actions performed:
Observed behavior:
This suggests the issue is not caused solely by repository size, Git history size, or active user requests.
The quota appears to continue decreasing even after:
Please investigate whether quota accounting, background task attribution, delayed reconciliation, or server-side session activity may be involved.
This needs a charge ledger, not just a percent gauge. Each quota delta should have an origin such as
foreground_prompt,background_task,resume/indexing,retry,memory_writer, orserver_adjustment, plus session/thread id, model, token buckets, request id, and observed reset/window id.That would let users prove the important case here: quota moved while no foreground task was active. Without that split, idle drain, delayed reconciliation, and background work all look the same.
Generated with ax - https://github.com/Necmttn/ax
I am seeing a possibly related Codex usage-metering issue on a ChatGPT Plus account.
Unlike the original report, I was actively running tasks, but the amount of usage consumed appears highly disproportionate to the workload.
Environment
Exact timeline
The five-hour usage limit reset at exactly 12:07 PM KST. I started the first task immediately after the reset.
Task 1
The task was documentation and prompt-governance refactoring.
Visible results:
Task 2
The task was substantially smaller than Task 1.
Visible results:
The entire newly reset five-hour allowance was exhausted in approximately 47 minutes across two documentation-focused tasks.
The Codex app task history shows the timestamps and the model change from Terra to Luna. To my knowledge, no other Codex task, CLI session, IDE integration, or cloud task was running concurrently.
I understand that Codex usage depends on context size, reasoning, tool calls, and internal agent turns rather than only the visible number of file changes. However, this consumption is dramatically higher than my recent experience with GPT-5.5, where I was able to complete several longer implementation tasks within one usage window.
Could the team please investigate whether this may involve:
I can provide sanitized prompts, completion summaries, exact timestamps, and additional screenshots privately if needed.
<img width="985" height="248" alt="Image" src="https://github.com/user-attachments/assets/6ba03c8d-d4ca-400e-bc50-7340d8916f73" />
Hi, thank you for sharing such a detailed timeline.
As far as I can determine, ordinary ChatGPT usage and Codex usage are not directly tied to the same visible quota meter. Otherwise, exhausting and blocking the Codex allowance would presumably also block ordinary ChatGPT usage at the same time. That has not been my experience, although I cannot confirm the exact server-side accounting mechanism.
Your reported consumption still looks unusually high, especially because the entire freshly reset five-hour allowance disappeared during two documentation-focused tasks.
One additional check may be useful. During my own investigation, I discovered that Codex could be running through local background processes and scheduled automations even when I was not manually submitting anything in the desktop interface.
In my case, background commands were launching real autonomous sessions such as:
codex exec --ephemeral --full-auto ...Those are actual Codex tasks and may consume quota even though no foreground task is visibly running in the desktop application.
Since you are using Windows, I recommend checking the following.
1. Find all Codex-related processes and inspect their command lines
Open PowerShell as Administrator and run:
Hello Cherry,
Just to clarify, this is not a suspended ChatGPT Team or Business workspace
issue. I am using an active ChatGPT Plus account, and my request concerns
unexpectedly rapid depletion of the Codex five-hour usage allowance.
I will provide the requested screenshots and incident details below.
2026년 7월 10일 (금) 오후 3:44, excessive-eng @.***>님이 작성:
Hello Cherry,
I performed one additional test today and observed the same issue again.
Date: July 12, 2026
Timezone: KST (UTC+9)
Model: GPT-5.6 Terra
Reasoning level: High
Image generation: None
Visible parallel Codex sessions: None
Usage Dashboard:
remaining
remaining
In approximately 10 minutes and 41 seconds:
The task involved code review, tests, and corrections in one existing
project. I am attaching the two timestamped screenshots.
This is now the third similar incident I have documented across July 10,
July 11, and July 12.
I understand that usage can vary depending on model, reasoning level,
context size, and task complexity. However, I cannot determine whether this
usage was caused by the visible task, context processing, retries, or
background activity because the Codex dashboard does not provide a usage
breakdown.
I do not have a screen recording because the unexpected depletion cannot be
predicted in advance. I do not intend to consume additional paid usage
solely to reproduce the issue again for a recording.
Please escalate the case using the account, timestamps, and screenshots
already provided, and review the server-side usage records for these three
incidents.
Please confirm whether the case has been escalated.
Best,
Kang Min
2026년 7월 10일 (금) 오후 5:54, 김강민 @.***>님이 작성: