Codex will spend a saved limit reset, but only when asked

Codex now has a switch that lets the agent spend one of your saved limit resets for you, but only if you ask for it in the conversation and your current limit is down to 10% or less. The setting surfaced in a post on Threads and lives in the Usage & billing section.

At a glance

• The new toggle, called "Allow Codex to use resets", lets the agent redeem a banked reset during a conversation, and its description says plainly that resets are never used automatically.
• Both conditions have to hold at once: you explicitly request the reset in the chat, and the limit you are working against has 10% or less of its allowance remaining.
• The setting text doesn't say how many resets you can keep in the bank or whether the 10% threshold is fixed, and banked resets still expire 30 days after they are granted.

If you haven't been following Codex limits, the reset bank is new. On June 12, 2026 OpenAI announced that Codex users could save rate limit resets and spend them later. Before that, according to an OpenAI community forum post, the Codex team reset weekly limits for all users after major milestones or big bug fixes. Anthropic has since offered a similar reset in Claude Code.

The reset bank arrived on June 11 with one free reset for eligible users

The Codex changelog dates reset banking to June 11, 2026. It says the Codex app 26.609 release added banking for Plus and Pro users. OpenAI's announcement on X the next day named Go, Plus, Pro and Business users, and the launch gave every eligible user one free reset.

A referral promotion ran alongside the launch. From June 11 through June 24, eligible Plus and Pro users could invite up to three friends. When an eligible friend sent their first Codex message, both people got a banked reset. OpenAI's Help Center says referral-reward resets must be used within 30 days of being added to the bank, unless the offer says otherwise.

What were Codex users complaining about before the bank?

Mostly about running out at the wrong moment. By Pasquale Pillitteri's account, the reset bank came after about three months of steady complaints about limits on GitHub and the developer forum. A typical one: the limit runs out mid-refactor and the automatic reset arrives at 3 a.m.

Pillitteri also writes that since April 2, usage has been counted in actual tokens, using the same rules as the API. So the number of messages you get depends on how complex the work is.

According to Startup Fortune, OpenAI said on April 2 that more than 2 million builders used Codex weekly, and on the same day moved Codex pricing toward token-based usage and introduced pay-as-you-go Codex seats. Startup Fortune also cites Bloomberg, which reported 10 million users across Codex and ChatGPT Work by July 21.

How does a saved reset differ from the scheduled one?

According to Pasquale Pillitteri, every Codex plan has two caps. One is a rolling 5-hour window shared between local CLI messages and cloud tasks. The other is a weekly limit for sustained workloads. Both used to clear on fixed schedules, and a saved reset works like a token that clears the counter the moment you spend it.

AI Feature Drop describes the normal reset as one that arrives on the plan's usage window, while a banked one sits in reserve until redeemed. The new setting adds one step. You say in the conversation that you want a reset, Codex checks that your current limit has 10% or less remaining, and only then takes one from the bank.

Think of a spare key left with a neighbour along with a rule: use it only when I call, and only if I am actually locked out.

Each banked reset expires 30 days after it is granted

Banked resets can be used for 30 days after they are granted, and according to Startup Fortune that window drew complaints. GitHub issue openai/codex#28888, filed on June 18, asked for a longer window. A forum thread on July 2 said users couldn't see when each reset expires. OpenAI Support replied that the interface didn't show per-reset expiration dates and that it would pass the feedback along.

OpenAI also kept issuing resets of its own. Pasquale Pillitteri reports that after GPT-5.6 launched on 9 July 2026, OpenAI reset Codex limits twice in one day, on 10 July. On 12 July it temporarily removed the 5-hour window. Banking runs alongside these resets that OpenAI starts itself.

The setting's own text is all we have on the new behaviour. It doesn't say how many resets you can bank, whether the 10% line is fixed, or which reset Codex spends when several sit in the bank. In our view, that last gap is the one to watch: per Startup Fortune, the interface didn't show per-reset expiry dates as of July, so you couldn't check which reset the agent would spend.

Waiting on per-reset expiry dates

The open item is the one OpenAI Support took away in July: showing an expiration date for each banked reset in the Codex interface. No date for that change has been given. Until it lands, the toggle in Usage & billing decides whether Codex can spend a reset at your request or whether you keep that call for yourself.