High CPU usage (Up to 100%) on Windows caused by repeated Git scans of large untracked directories #35008

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

Codex & OWL Version 26.715.72359 Released 22.07.2026

What subscription do you have?

Pro 5x

What platform is your computer?

Windows

What issue are you seeing?

After a recent Codex Windows update, opening Codex caused sustained high CPU usage even when no tasks were running. Restarting did not fix the issue.

The load was distributed across:

• WMI Provider Host
• Codex
• Antivirus/Windows Defender
• Repeatedly spawned Git processes
• Closing Codex immediately returned CPU usage to normal.

Investigation
The active repository contained a large local artifact directory with tens of thousands of untracked files and more than 1 GB of data.

Codex appeared to repeatedly run Git repository inspections. Enumerating the untracked files was slow and also triggered additional WMI and antivirus activity.
A full git status did not complete within 24 seconds.

Workaround
I added the local artifact directory to:
.git/info/exclude

After adding the exclusion:

• Untracked entries reported by Git dropped to zero
• git status completed in approximately 56 ms
• Repeated Git processes stopped
• WMI and antivirus CPU usage returned to normal
• Codex remained usable

What steps can reproduce the bug?

working directory had .pnpm-store not in .gitignore. CPU load goes up to 100%

What is the expected behavior?

It may also be useful to detect unusually slow Git status operations and warn users about large untracked directories.

Additional information

No response