Cloud Browser provisioning failure on ChatGPT Pro

Potential duplicates detected. Please review them and close your issue if it is a duplicate.

• #37539

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Thank you. I reviewed #37539. The two issues appear related, but they do not reproduce at exactly the same failure point.

In #37539, a fresh backend tab was initially created and returned a tab ID. The failure occurred afterward: the Cloud Browser UI never surfaced, and subsequent tab refresh/visibility operations timed out.

In this issue (#38357), browser discovery succeeds, but creating even a blank tab consistently fails before any tab ID or user-visible browser surface is returned:

CDP operation create tab timed out after 20000ms

As a result, navigation to https://example.com is never attempted.

The shared characteristics are ChatGPT Pro, ChatGPT Work on the web, Windows, a simple public page requiring no authentication, and a persistent 20-second CDP timeout across fresh conversations. However, #38357 documents a failure earlier in the provisioning/CDP handoff sequence than #37539.

I therefore suggest keeping #38357 open as a distinct reproduction unless the maintainers confirm that both failure stages share the same root cause and prefer consolidation under #37539.

Potential duplicates detected. Please review them and close your issue if it is a duplicate. * [[ChatGPT Work web] Cloud Browser tab is created but UI never surfaces; CDP refresh times out #37539](https://github.com/openai/codex/issues/37539) _Powered by Codex Action_

Update for support case #38357

The ChatGPT Work cloud-browser startup failure has now been reproduced under a fully isolated test environment.

DATE/TIME:
13 August 2026, approximately 16:59 CEST

ACCOUNT:
ChatGPT Pro

TEST ENVIRONMENT:

• Windows desktop
• Microsoft Edge
• Edge InPrivate window
• New, non-project ChatGPT Work conversation
• Android mobile hotspot used as the laptop’s internet connection
• Fritzbox/home-network path was not used for this test
• Public target page only: https://example.com
• No login to any external website
• No upload or download
• No retry

EXACT TEST RESULT:

BROWSER_INSTANCE_STARTED = NO
FINAL_URL = NOT_AVAILABLE
PAGE_TITLE = NOT_AVAILABLE
ERROR_MESSAGE = Error executing tool js:

The failure occurred before any cloud-browser instance was created and before the target URL was reached.

A previous minimal capability test in a separate fresh ChatGPT conversation had also returned:

BROWSER_INSTANCE_STARTED = NO
FINAL_URL = NOT_AVAILABLE
PAGE_TITLE = NOT_AVAILABLE

The issue therefore persists after changing:

• browser environment,
• browser profile/session,
• private-browsing mode,
• and network connection.

Please investigate:

1. account-specific ChatGPT Work Cloud / cloud-browser provisioning or entitlement;
2. backend tool-execution logs associated with this failed Work run;
3. whether the account requires a server-side reset or reprovisioning of the cloud-browser capability.

Please do not close the case as a local Fritzbox, Chrome-cache, or Chrome-extension issue without reviewing the Work backend logs.

I can provide the Work conversation URL, screenshots, and—if specifically required—one controlled HAR-recorded reproduction.

<img width="1432" height="886" alt="Image" src="https://github.com/user-attachments/assets/e751c229-2880-4071-be12-c5f7c495b5d7" />

Neustart durchgeführt, Cookies bewusst nicht gelöscht, neutraler Test weiterhin BROWSER_INSTANCE_STARTED = NO / Error executing tool js:

<img width="1357" height="690" alt="Image" src="https://github.com/user-attachments/assets/19c5b5b3-53e1-43b6-9650-6bf23f2f19c1" /> REPORT_TIMESTAMP_UTC = 2026-08-18T10:06:17Z
LOCAL_TIME_CEST = 2026-08-18T12:06:17+02:00
EVENT_TIME = IMMEDIATELY_BEFORE_REPORT / EXACT_SECOND_NOT_RECORDED

I am experiencing the same failure on ChatGPT Pro in the United States.

The problem persisted across August 27–28, 2026, after Cloud Browser had worked extensively earlier in the day.

Reproduction:

• ChatGPT Work successfully discovers a Chrome/CDP browser allocation.
• The allocation contains no open user tabs and no selected tab.
• Creating even a blank tab repeatedly fails after exactly 20 seconds:

CDP operation create tab timed out after 20000ms

• Refreshing the tab list has also failed with:

CDP operation refresh tabs timed out after 20000ms

• No hidden or delayed tab appears afterward.
• This reproduced across multiple fresh Work conversations and newly discovered browser allocations.
• Navigation was never reached; therefore the intended website, its authentication system, and user credentials were never contacted.
• The OpenAI status incident from August 27 is marked resolved, but this account continued reproducing the failure afterward.
• OpenAI Support reported no current incident and suggested clearing all Cloud Browser data, but could not manually reset or reprovision the allocation.
• Entering /feedback in the affected ChatGPT surface produced no visible feedback interface or session ID.

Please review the backend tool-execution logs and investigate stale or unhealthy account-side Cloud Browser/CDP provisioning. Please also advise whether the account can be server-side reset or reprovisioned without deleting all stored Cloud Browser authentication data.

I can reproduce the same account-side Cloud Browser / ChatGPT Work provisioning failure from ChatGPT Desktop on Windows.

Environment

• Surface: ChatGPT Desktop creating fresh ChatGPT Work cloud conversations
• OS: Windows build 26200
• Bundled Codex command runner visible locally: 0.150.0-alpha.12.2
• Date observed: 2026-08-28
• Minimal public target: https://example.com
• No external authentication, upload, download, Miro access, or skill/plugin execution in the minimal reproduction

Minimal reproduction after a full desktop-app restart

Prompt:

Open https://example.com in the built-in cloud browser and report the exact page title. Do not open or modify anything else.

Observed:

• Task dispatch initially returned only a temporary client reference.
• A permanent Work conversation did not appear for 177.338 seconds.
• After it appeared, it contained only the user message.
• No assistant output, browser tool call, browser instance, tab, URL, or page title was produced.
• The conversation remained active with no agent response for at least 374.281 seconds from dispatch.
• example.com was never reached.
• A full ChatGPT Desktop restart did not resolve the failure.

Three immediately preceding fresh Work failures

These occurred before the neutral example.com reproduction:

1. 250.050 s: browser state initially returned a no-progress loading checkpoint, then the run ended with a network error before any target content was read.
2. Approximately 122 s: the managed browser never connected before navigation; the conversation produced no agent message.
3. 417.524 s: the permanent conversation appeared only after approximately 114 s; a browser workspace connected, but target-page state never returned.

All four attempts used fresh Work conversations. No target-page mutation occurred.

Built-in feedback failure

Submitting /feedback for this incident failed, including one retry, with:

Feedback upload failed The upload failed, but your Feedback ID is unchanged.

The failed feedback upload makes the affected session harder to submit through the documented in-app diagnostic path.

Internal Work conversation references and the Feedback ID are available to OpenAI through a private support channel, but are intentionally omitted from this public comment.

This appears consistent with stale or unhealthy account-side Work / Cloud Browser provisioning rather than a target-site, local browser-cookie, extension, or page-authentication problem. Please investigate backend provisioning/tool-execution logs and advise whether the account-side browser allocation can be reset or reprovisioned.