[Windows 26.901.6511.0] Repeated renderer crashes and UI recovery while the main process stays alive

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

26.901.6511.0 (installed Windows package: OpenAI.Codex; executable: ChatGPT.exe)

What subscription do you have?

ChatGPT Pro

What platform is your computer?

Windows 11 Pro for Workstations, build 26200, x64

What issue are you seeing?

The desktop interface repeatedly disappears/reloads and then returns during an active task. This interrupts the user experience and looks like the app is closing and reopening. Local diagnostics confirm renderer crashes; the main application process remained alive.

Six Crashpad sidecar files were recorded on 2026-09-07 at the following local times (UTC+05:00):

• 22:47:47
• 23:25:33
• 23:33:00
• 23:34:10
• 23:36:37
• 23:41:02

Each of these six sidecars contains:

{"capture_kind":"crash","osarch":"x86_64","ptype":"renderer"}

The main ChatGPT.exe process had been running continuously since 19:17:35. The last Crashpad sidecar was written at 23:41:02.256; a new renderer process was created at 23:41:02.778. This is consistent with renderer recovery after a crash rather than a full main-process restart.

The current-day desktop text log files were empty when checked. The retained sidecar metadata does not contain an exception code or stack trace, so the underlying cause has not been identified.

What steps can reproduce the bug?

No minimal deterministic reproduction is available yet. The observed workflow was:

1. Run the Windows desktop app and continue an existing, long-running task.
2. Work with documents/spreadsheets, including browser automation in external Google Chrome through the ChatGPT browser extension.
3. During continued work, the desktop interface intermittently disappears/reloads and returns.
4. Inspect local Crashpad reports: the six records above identify the affected process as renderer.

Browser activity is context, not a confirmed trigger. A particular click or tool call has not been isolated. This was not a deliberate app restart.

Uploaded feedback/session ID: 01a07c40-4c02-7541-b954-de791a7c9d83.

What is the expected behavior?

The desktop interface should remain stable and usable throughout an active task, without repeated renderer crashes or unexpected reloads.

Additional information

Feedback was submitted through the desktop app, and the app displayed “Feedback uploaded”.

Feedback ID: 01a07c40-4c02-7541-b954-de791a7c9d83

Please use this feedback ID to correlate the diagnostic upload with the renderer crash times above.

Potentially related reports reviewed: #43347, #43437 and #43388. I have not established that either has the same root cause. In particular, #43347 describes closing the last in-app browser tab and a browser/main-process crash, whereas these records identify renderer crashes with the main process remaining alive.

#43388 describes an immediate startup reload loop on Windows 10. This report concerns intermittent crashes after the app has successfully started and an active task has been running on Windows 11.

Public content is limited to sanitized technical observations. Private document contents, screenshots, full session transcripts, local user paths and raw dumps are not included.

Start with the six retained Crashpad sidecar records and correlate their renderer timestamps with feedback ID 01a07c40-4c02-7541-b954-de791a7c9d83. The report provides no minimal reproduction, exception code, stack trace, or source files, so first determine whether the failure can be reproduced or diagnosed from the uploaded diagnostics. Done means identifying the renderer failure and verifying that the Windows interface remains stable during a comparable active task.