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Codex Mac app high memory usage after latest update on macOS ( Codex 26.422.21637 ) #19333

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Codex Mac app high memory usage after latest update on macOS ( Codex 26.422.21637 )#19333
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appIssues related to the Codex desktop appbugSomething isn't workingperformance

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@PrabhathMalindaGit
PrabhathMalindaGit
opened on Apr 24, 2026

What version of the Codex App are you using (From “About Codex” dialog)?

Codex 26.422.21637

What subscription do you have?

Chatgpt Plus

What platform is your computer?

Mac os ( macOS Tahoe 26.4.1 )

What issue are you seeing?

I’ve noticed higher memory usage from the Codex Mac app after updating to the latest version, and I’m trying to figure out if this is expected or a bug.

After launching Codex, it loads normally but then gradually starts using a lot of memory over time. Before the recent update, the app used noticeably less memory on the same machine.

Setup:

MacBook Air M2 15 ( 8gb)

Latest macOS (macOS Tahoe 26.4.1)

Latest Codex app ( Codex 26.422.21637)

Is anyone else seeing increased memory usage with the latest Codex release on macOS, or is it just my setup?

Image

What steps can reproduce the bug?

Open the Codex desktop app on macOS.
Start a normal coding session
Leave Codex open in the background while working. You can observe increased memory usage compared to previous versions.

What is the expected behavior?

I expect the Codex app’s memory usage to stabilize at a reasonable level during normal use and not keep growing over time when the app is mostly idle.

Ideally, memory usage should be similar to or lower than previous versions on the same machine and workloads

Additional information

The memory increase happens even if I only have one project open.

Activity

  1. PrabhathMalindaGit
    added
    appIssues related to the Codex desktop app
    on Apr 24, 2026
  2. github-actions
    added
    bugSomething isn't working
    on Apr 24, 2026

  3. github-actions commented on Apr 24, 2026

    @github-actions
    github-actionsbot
    on Apr 24, 2026 – with GitHub Actions
    Contributor

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

    Powered by Codex Action

  4. Marc-Lee-0807 commented on Apr 24, 2026

    @Marc-Lee-0807
    Marc-Lee-0807
    on Apr 24, 2026

    MacBook Pro M1 Pro ( 16gb)

    Latest macOS (macOS Tahoe 26.4.1)

    Latest Codex app ( Codex 26.422.21637)

    ChatGPT Business

    Having the exact same issue. It's barely working. Other apps are affected by the heavy loading.

  5. TDY13 commented on Apr 24, 2026

    @TDY13
    TDY13
    on Apr 24, 2026

    019dbef9-abbf-7f52-bfbb-bfe6fd4a7faa

    MacBook M3 pro 18 GB
    macOS Tahoe 26.3
    ChatGPT Pro plan

    Image Image

  6. EloraTaurus commented on Apr 25, 2026

    @EloraTaurus
    EloraTaurus
    on Apr 25, 2026

    Possibly related to the high resource usage being reported:

    During extended use (~4 hours, ~7 sessions without restarting Codex), a Python process spawned by Codex grew to extremely high memory usage (~135 GB in Activity Monitor), causing heavy swap usage (~25 GB) and system degradation (UI lag, audio crackling).

    Restarting Codex immediately resolved the issue, suggesting the process was not being cleaned up or was accumulating state over time.

    It's unclear whether this is:

    • a memory leak in a long-running Python process
    • multiple Python runtimes not being terminated between sessions
    • or unbounded in-memory data accumulation during agent execution

    Environment:

    • macOS 26.4.1
    • Codex: GPT-Codex 5.3 (Medium)
    • Project located in OneDrive (high file churn, though .git has been externalised)
    • Continuous usage without restart

    Additional notes:

    • I attempted to reproduce by re-running Python3 tasks in a fresh session, but memory usage remained stable.
    • This suggests the issue may be tied to long-lived processes or cumulative session state rather than a single execution.

    Happy to provide logs if someone can point me to the relevant locations (Python subprocess logs, Codex agent logs, etc).

    Image

  7. jkenneydaniel commented on Apr 30, 2026

    @jkenneydaniel
    jkenneydaniel
    on Apr 30, 2026

    Woke my computer from sleep today and Codex was using 138GB. There were like 4-5 codex_chronicle processes also using 25-35GB each. I am impressed honestly.

  8. etraut-openai
    added
    performance
    on May 3, 2026

  9. rdsedmundo commented on May 12, 2026

    @rdsedmundo
    rdsedmundo
    on May 12, 2026

    Same here. Latest codex, had 80GB usage in iTerm and it nearly crashed my whole machine. Very annoying and baffling that this is not being controlled properly.

  10. zakblacki commented on Sep 6, 2026

    @zakblacki
    zakblacki
    on Sep 6, 2026

    Same issue every time I start the app (without even doing anything yet) it’s consuming a lot and it keeps increasing when we leave it open after sometime working on it few giga

    • So I was wondering if this cause over old chat accumulating (instead of archiving have to delete)
    • Or is because of Skills/Plugins
    • Or because of MCP (likely)
    • Or because of Python/node process (that keep reappearing even if we close them)
    • Or because of Chrome (disabling extension doesn't solve it either)
    • Or is it because of launching terminals inside a workflow project (closing these terminals doesn’t solve it)
    • Or the app itself need improvement just not that optimized

    Note that I’m using latest update and I have old Mac M1 8gb RAM

    Image Image Image

  11. PeterWCox commented on Oct 9, 2026

    @PeterWCox
    PeterWCox
    on Oct 9, 2026
    Image

    I have exactly the same issue - constantly high memory usage.
    I run a lot of threads simultaneously but not unduly so.

    I wonder if theres too many browser windows are open

    I have to restart Codex once a day or so.

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