Codex 0.163.0
By Steven Van ·
The release adds a leader key, a /daemon restart command and parallel read-only tools, and it fixes proxy checks and Windows and WSL pasting.
Codex 0.163.0 adds a searchable settings screen and lets users steer a response by sending a follow-up while Codex is still working. The release is published as rust-v0.163.0 on GitHub.
New features
- /config: search preferences across categories, change supported settings immediately, and see which changes need a restart.
- Steering: a follow-up sent during a response takes effect immediately. Interrupting a turn also stops active Code Mode cells and their nested tool calls.
- /keymap: a leader key can now be configured, with Ctrl+X as the default. Shortcut hints stay open until you choose or cancel, and voice mute moves to F9.
- /daemon: restart a managed background server. Codex warns about work the restart could interrupt, then reconnects automatically.
- Parallel tools: independent read-only tools, including skill, memory and conversation-history lookups, can run in parallel.
- Daybreak: enabled by default for eligible accounts. codex exec can also select it with an OpenAI API key when the server offers access.
Bug fixes
- Resuming a saved thread restores its permissions and network approvals, while respecting explicit overrides and current managed policy.
- The network proxy now checks permission before a DNS lookup, rejects duplicate Host headers, and stops credential aliases from bypassing inspection hooks.
- /side returns to an existing side conversation after switching threads, and answers to pending prompts go back to the thread that asked.
- On Windows, Ctrl+V and Shift+Insert paste text as well as images. On WSL, repeated pastes reuse the clipboard reader, and copy attempts time out instead of hanging.
- Local commands finish promptly when a child keeps an output pipe open, and remote commands preserve late-arriving output so the final poll can collect it.
- codex exec no longer prints the same file diff again after an unrelated command.
Docs and chores
The bundled OpenAI Docs guidance now covers migrations to the GPT-6 family, including model-specific reasoning, tool use and data residency considerations. The documentation also clarifies how the Linux sandbox uses bubblewrap for filesystem isolation and seccomp for syscall filtering.
Codex now uses its standard shell executor and no longer bundles a patched zsh. Configurations that use the retired shell flags receive a migration notice. Linux and macOS release packages are smaller because symbols are stripped from packaged binaries, with the symbols kept in the original build outputs.
