OpenAI Codex CLI
https://github.com/openai/codex
OpenAI's actively developed OSS terminal coding agent (Apr 2025), now written in Rust (codex-rs replaced the original TS CLI); also IDE extension + desktop app. Separate from the Codex Web cloud agent and the retired 2021 Codex model API. The codex mcp-server command (Codex as an MCP server) was deprecated on 2026-08-24 and removed in CLI 0.154.0 (2026-09-09); OpenAI points integrations to the experimental Codex app server, and codex mcp still connects Codex to external MCP servers.
Deprecated · Verified 2026-10-29 · fresh as of 2026-10-29 · 70 cited facts, 5 with a third-party source · 2 recorded changes · Suggest a correction
At a glance
- Tier
- T1
- Section
- Agent IDEs & coding harnesses
- Latest release
- v0.165.0 (2026-10-27) third-party fix
- License
- Apache-2.0 repo fix
- GitHub
- openai/codex — ~128k stars, last commit 2026-10 repo fix
- Pricing
- CLI free (Apache-2.0); usage via ChatGPT plans (Free/Go limited, Plus $20/mo, Pro $100–200/mo, Business $25/user/mo) or API-key per-token billing third-party fix
- Funding
- OpenAI (parent) — $40B Series I 2025-03 $300B val repo fix
- Freshness
- 2026-10-29 fix
- Layer
- agent-infra repo fix
- Licensing
- open-source repo fix
- Developer activity
- OpenRank 885.42 (12-mo avg 407.37) · 11814 participants — 2026-09 third-party fix
When to use
Optimised for: OpenAI o-series + Codex model as long-running coding agent
Anti-fit: OpenAI-model-only; CLI-only
Pros & cons
Pros
OSS Apache-2.0 means hackable by community; first-party OpenAI distribution + auto-routing to Codex / o-series.
Cons
OpenAI-only model lock; younger than Claude Code with less ecosystem (skills/hooks); naming collision with deprecated old Codex API and ChatGPT "Codex" cloud agent.
Claims & capabilities
Released 2025-04 as OSS Apache-2.0 CLI; positioned as OpenAI's answer to Claude Code.
Technical surface
- API surface
- CLI (Rust); MCP support
- Backend storage
- local ~/.codex/ + git
- Deployment
- Self-hosted only — local CLI (npm/Homebrew); model calls go to OpenAI via ChatGPT sign-in or API key
- Embedding model
- not applicable — not a memory product
- Multi-tenancy
- per-user (terminal-local)
- MCP
- yes — MCP client (mcp_servers in ~/.codex/config.toml); documented in Codex MCP docs
- A2A
- searched not found
- OpenTelemetry
- searched not found
Compare OpenAI Codex CLI with…
Alternatives to OpenAI Codex CLI → live options ranked by shared design, licence, hosting and MCP support
Similar systems
Other agent ides & coding harnesses in the catalog, ranked by inbound references.
- Claude Code (Anthropic) T1
Anthropic's agentic coding tool: Claude as a coding agent in the terminal, IDEs (VS Code, JetBrains), desktop app, web/mobile, GitHub and Slack. Context via CLAUDE.md, skills, hooks, subagents and MCP servers.
- Cursor (IDE) T1
AI-first IDE that forked VS Code; Composer (multi-file edit) and Agent Mode (long-running coding agent) are its flagship surfaces. Memory layer = .cursorrules / Rules; recall via repo-aware Context Engine. Anysphere (parent) raised $900M Series C at $9.9B in May 2025; acquired by SpaceX (announced 2026-08-14, terms undisclosed), product continues under the Cursor brand.
- Opencode (SST) T2
SST team's open-source terminal coding agent — TypeScript, multi-model, MCP-native. Released 2025; explicitly positioned as a permissively-licensed Claude Code alternative. Memory via AGENTS.md (the emerging cross-harness convention).
- Bedrock AgentCore (AWS) T2
AWS Bedrock AgentCore — managed runtime to deploy + scale + observe agents. Multi-component: Runtime, Identity, Memory, Gateway, Browser, Code Interpreter, Observability. Distinct from Bedrock Agents (older fixed-config product); AgentCore is the 2025 framework-agnostic runtime for any agent (LangGraph, CrewAI, Strands, OpenAI Agents SDK).
- GitHub Copilot (Agent Mode) T1
The original AI coding assistant (Copilot in editor; 2021). 2025 evolved into a full agentic surface: chat, completions, Agent Mode (multi-step), and Copilot Workspace. Backed by Microsoft. Distinct row from Workspace — this row covers the everyday in-editor + agent mode product, Workspace covers the hosted spec-driven workflow.
- Goose (Block) T2
Block (Square)'s open-source on-machine agent — terminal + desktop GUI. Modular: extensions for shell, computer-control, MCP servers; multi-model via LiteLLM. Released 2024; positioned as a general-purpose local agent, not coding-only. Goose Recipes provide reusable agent workflows.
Sources (69 cited facts, 5 third-party)
Each fact links to the page it came from; the badge says who published it (how to read sources).
- What it is Terminal-native agentic coding harness (OpenAI) repo
- What it does & what's distinct OpenAI's actively developed OSS terminal coding agent (Apr 2025), now written in Rust (c… third-party
- Claims / benefits Released 2025-04 as OSS Apache-2.0 CLI; positioned as OpenAI's answer to Claude Code. repo
- Modalities text repo
- Created 2025-04 repo
- Latest release v0.165.0 (2026-10-27) third-party
- License Apache-2.0 repo
- GitHub openai/codex — ~128k stars, last commit 2026-10 repo
- Mindshare Front-page HN launch; covered by TechCrunch, The Verge repo
- Funding OpenAI (parent) — $40B Series I 2025-03 $300B val repo
- Customers / scale broad horizontal; OpenAI API customers repo
- Pricing CLI free (Apache-2.0); usage via ChatGPT plans (Free/Go limited, Plus $20/mo, Pro $100–2… third-party
- Compliance SOC 2 Type II (OpenAI); ISO 27001 repo
- Data handling OpenAI API data policy (zero-retention available for enterprise) repo
- Deployment Self-hosted only — local CLI (npm/Homebrew); model calls go to OpenAI via ChatGPT sign-i… repo
- HQ US (San Francisco; OpenAI) repo
- Founders / pedigree OpenAI — Codex team (Greg Brockman et al.) repo
- Memory volume / scale no scale claim repo
- Performance Used on SWE-bench Verified runs by OpenAI; reported parity with Claude Code on small repos repo
- Code/weights release Open-source — github.com/openai/codex repo
- API surface CLI (Rust); MCP support repo
- Backend storage local ~/.codex/ + git repo
- Multi-tenancy per-user (terminal-local) repo
- Encryption TLS for OpenAI API repo
- SSO / RBAC via OpenAI org console repo
- Versioning memories in git repo
- Schema evolution free-form / no schema repo
- Namespace primitives per-project + per-user (~/.codex/memories) repo
- Contradiction handling human-arbitrate repo
- MCP support yes — MCP client (mcp_servers in ~/.codex/config.toml); documented in Codex MCP docs vendor
- Import / export memories are markdown repo
- Validated verticals coding agents — broad horizontal repo
- Time to running <10min (`npm i -g @openai/codex` or brew) repo
- Anti-fit OpenAI-model-only; CLI-only repo
- Optimised for OpenAI o-series + Codex model as long-running coding agent repo
- Adjacent infrastructure OpenAI API (Codex / o-series); MCP for tool extensibility; runs locally with TLS-only ne… repo
- Pros OSS Apache-2.0 means hackable by community; first-party OpenAI distribution + auto-routi… repo
- Cons OpenAI-only model lock; younger than Claude Code with less ecosystem (skills/hooks); nam… repo
- Project & sources github.com/openai/codex; developers.openai.com/codex repo
- obs-langsmith no repo
- obs-opentelemetry yes repo
- obs-helicone yes third-party
- obs-custom Inherits OpenAI API observability surface; OTLP endpoint config in CLI repo
- cost-token-budget yes repo
- cost-prompt-caching yes vendor
- cost-semantic-caching no repo
- cost-batching no repo
- cost-model-routing yes repo
- cost-streaming-only yes repo
- cost-observability-cost-attribution no repo
- eval-langsmith-evals no repo
- eval-braintrust no repo
- eval-weights-and-biases-agent no repo
- eval-helicone-evals no repo
- eval-custom-test-harness yes repo
- eval-human-loop no repo
- eval-production-traffic-replay no repo
- commit-trajectory [{"ym":"2026-04","cum":6052},{"ym":"2026-05","cum":6539}] repo
- download-trajectory [{"ym":"2023-05","monthly":0,"cum":0},{"ym":"2023-06","monthly":0,"cum":0},{"ym":"2023-0… registry
- cost-input-usd-per-mtok 0 repo
- cost-output-usd-per-mtok 0 repo
- cost-tier free repo
- cost-pricing-model free-tier repo
- cost-last-verified 2026-06-29 repo
- architecture-deployment-locus local repo
- licensing-bucket open-source repo
- positioning-platform-vs-product product repo
- taxonomy-three-layer-rollup agent-infra repo
- developer-activity-opendigger {"activity":13770.5,"as_of":"2026-09","openrank_12mo":407.37,"openrank_current":885.42,"… third-party
What changed
Changes to this record's lifecycle, licence, release, pricing and hosting facts, from the catalog's git history. Subscribe (Atom)
- 2026-10-29
- Latest release “v0.164.0 (2026-10-23) — tag rust-v0.164.0” → “v0.165.0 (2026-10-27)” source
- 2026-10-26
- Latest release “codex-cli rolling releases (2025-2026)” → “v0.164.0 (2026-10-23) — tag rust-v0.164.0” source
- Pricing “Free (OSS); usage via OpenAI API” → “CLI free (Apache-2.0); usage via ChatGPT plans (Free/Go limited, Plus $20/mo, Pro $100–200/mo, Business $25/user/mo) or API-key per-token billing” source
- Deployment “Self-host CLI; API calls to OpenAI cloud” → “Self-hosted only — local CLI (npm/Homebrew); model calls go to OpenAI via ChatGPT sign-in or API key” source
- MCP support “native — Codex CLI is an MCP client” → “yes — MCP client (mcp_servers in ~/.codex/config.toml); documented in Codex MCP docs” source
Related systems
References (2)
- Model Context Protocol (MCP spec) depends on at runtime — adjacent-infrastructure cell: OpenAI API (Codex / o-series); MCP for tool extensibility; runs locally with TLS-only network egress
- OpenAI GPT family (GPT-5 / GPT-4o / o3 / o4) depends on at runtime — adjacent-infrastructure cell: OpenAI API (Codex / o-series); MCP for tool extensibility; runs locally with TLS-only network egress
Referenced by (26)
- agentgateway integrates with — agentgateway integrations docs have a Codex client page. (verified 2026-10-29)
- Arize Phoenix integrates with — Arize Phoenix docs have a OpenAI Codex CLI integration page. (verified 2026-10-29)
- Arthur Engine integrates with — Arthur Engine repo has an integrations/codex-observability integration. (verified 2026-10-29)
- Bifrost (Maxim AI) integrates with — Bifrost docs have a CLI-agent integration page for Codex CLI. (verified 2026-10-29)
- Braintrust integrates with — Braintrust docs have a OpenAI Codex CLI integration page. (verified 2026-10-29)
- Cloudflare AI Gateway integrates with — Cloudflare AI Gateway integrations docs have a OpenAI Codex page. (verified 2026-10-29)
- Comet ML integrates with — Comet's Opik docs have a OpenAI Codex CLI integration page. (verified 2026-10-29)
- Daytona integrates with — Daytona docs have a guide for running OpenAI Codex CLI with Daytona sandboxes. (verified 2026-10-29)
- Docker MCP Catalog, Toolkit & Gateway integrates with — Docker MCP Toolkit get-started page has connect-client instructions for Codex. (verified 2026-10-29)
- e2b integrates with — E2B docs have a OpenAI Codex CLI integration guide. (verified 2026-10-29)
- Fireworks AI integrates with — Fireworks AI docs integration: Codex (Nexus harness). (verified 2026-10-29)
- Helicone integrates with — Helicone docs have a OpenAI Codex CLI integration page. (verified 2026-10-29)
- HoneyHive integrates with — HoneyHive integrations docs have a OpenAI Codex CLI tracing/integration page. (verified 2026-10-29)
- Inspect AI integrates with — Inspect AI "Agent Bridge" page documents bridging Codex CLI agents into Inspect evaluations. (verified 2026-10-29)
- Laminar integrates with — Laminar integrations docs have a Codex observability page. (verified 2026-10-29)
- Langfuse integrates with — Langfuse's integrations directory has a OpenAI Codex CLI integration page. (verified 2026-10-29)
- LangSmith integrates with — LangSmith docs have a tracing integration page for OpenAI Codex CLI. (verified 2026-10-29)
- Mem0 integrates with — Mem0 docs have a Codex integration page (Add persistent memory to OpenAI Codex with automatic capture, automatic recall, a search tool, and six memory skills). (verified 2026-10-29)
- OpenRouter integrates with — OpenRouter docs have a cookbook page on using Codex CLI with OpenRouter. (verified 2026-10-29)
- Pinecone integrates with — Pinecone's integrations directory has a OpenAI Codex CLI integration page. (verified 2026-10-29)
- Portkey AI integrates with — Portkey docs have an OpenAI Codex app/library integration page. (verified 2026-10-29)
- Pydantic Logfire integrates with — Pydantic Logfire integrations docs have a Codex page. (verified 2026-10-29)
- Stagehand integrates with — Stagehand docs have a OpenAI Codex CLI integration page. (verified 2026-10-29)
- TrueFoundry AI Gateway integrates with — TrueFoundry AI Gateway ecosystem lists a OpenAI Codex CLI integration page. (verified 2026-10-29)
- Vercel AI Gateway integrates with — Vercel AI Gateway docs have a OpenAI Codex coding-agent page. (verified 2026-10-29)
- Vercel AI SDK integrates with — AI SDK docs have a Codex AI SDK harness provider page. (verified 2026-10-29)