You hit a Codex usage limit: what your account can actually do

What is happening

You have used up an allowance attached to your account. This is a metered limit doing its job, not a failure of the client or of your installation.

Two things are worth knowing before you start troubleshooting anything:

• Limits vary by plan. Codex is included across ChatGPT plans, including Free and Go, and the limits differ. A comparison with someone else’s account tells you nothing about yours.
• Some plans share an allowance. On plans that use shared allowances or credits, Codex and other features draw on the same pool when those features are available to you. Burning credits somewhere else can leave less for Codex.

What happens to the turn that was running

According to the official guidance, if you reach a limit during an active turn, Codex can continue working on that turn, subject to fair-use limits. After that turn, your choices are the ones your account shows.

If you are on a workspace with token-based billing, continuation can depend on the workspace budget and your own user limit, and the guidance is to ask your workspace admin which limit applied.

What to look at next

Open Settings or your usage dashboard. The official guidance is specific about what to check:

1. Which allowance is exhausted. There may be more than one.
2. Your credit balance, if your plan uses credits.
3. Any reset time shown.

In an active Codex CLI session, /status is the documented way to see this from inside the client.

Then read the limit notice itself. It lists the options available to your account, which is the only list that matters:

• add credits,
• apply an available reset,
• upgrade,
• or wait until the displayed reset time.

Different accounts see different options, so a missing option is not a bug.

What support will and will not do

The official guidance is unambiguous: OpenAI Support does not reset ChatGPT or Codex usage limits. Asking support to reset a limit you have legitimately reached is not a supported path.

Support is the right route for a different case: when your usage appears incorrect, when access has not returned after the stated reset time, or when you believe a reset you were eligible for was not applied as described.

Common wrong turns

• Assuming a reset is applied to everyone. Announcements and one-time resets have their own scope and eligibility. Your account decides whether you got one.
• Buying credits to fix a fault. Credits are an option the notice offers. If your problem is that a reset time passed and access did not return, credits are not the answer — that is a support case.
• Treating a limit banner as a client bug. The banner is account state. Reinstalling the client does not change account state.

How to tell you are unblocked

Requests are accepted again, and the usage screen shows an allowance that is no longer exhausted. If the displayed reset time has passed and you still cannot use Codex, that is a distinct situation with its own checks — see the reset-time-passed guide.

Known limits of this guidance

• Evidence level: documentary. Every statement here comes from the official help article as read on the review date.
• No allowance numbers or prices are quoted, because they vary by plan and change over time. Anything you read elsewhere as a fixed number should be checked against your own account.
• This guide does not cover API-key billing, which is a separate arrangement from plan-based usage.