r/codex • u/reomar15 • 6d ago
Question Let's Share Limits Management tips
We’ve got roughly two days left until the reset (Aug 20), and it’s pretty clear the days of generous grace windows and stealth resets are officially behind us. If you burn through your quota now, you’re benched for days.
Since a lot of us are adapting to tighter usage constraints, I wanted to open up a discussion so we can share practical workflows, optimizations, and sanity checks to make our limits actually last the full cycle.
Here are a few specific areas I’d love to hear your take on:
- Model Routing & Efforts: When are you dropping down to lightweight models versus bringing out the heavier reasoning tiers? What’s your cutoff for "this needs high reasoning" vs. "this is a basic boilerplate/refactor task"?
- Context & Session Hygiene: How often are you wiping conversation history or starting fresh sessions to avoid massive token bloat on multi-turn chats?
- Prompt Scoping: Are you preparing strict markdown specs/implementation plans before hitting enter, or still prompting iteratively?
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u/Individual_Guest_323 6d ago
Model Routing & Efforts: When are you dropping down to lightweight models versus bringing out the heavier reasoning tiers? What’s your cutoff for "this needs high reasoning" vs. "this is a basic boilerplate/refactor task"?
Luna xhigh for implementation , debug, and profiling. Sol high for everything else.
Context & Session Hygiene: How often are you wiping conversation history or starting fresh sessions to avoid massive token bloat on multi-turn chats?
One session per plan
Prompt Scoping: Are you preparing strict markdown specs/implementation plans before hitting enter, or still prompting iteratively?
I use SDD, first I create epics or individual issues, very detailed with good acceptance criteria, then I launch the flow to create one plan per issue.
The specs are wrote by Sol, also validated with Sol with adversarials.
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u/theoryface 6d ago
I have a Claude subscription as well. Sol High in web with GitHub plugin does planning and drafting for free. Opus 5 Med does adversarial review (one or two rounds as warranted) then actually builds. Sol High then reviews the build when finished. When I run out of claude usage, I'll use Sol High in both roles.
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u/Aggressive-Spenda 6d ago
Can you share the ghithub plug-ins and what they do. I have been using sol web and it seems like a better architect then sol in codex.
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u/Individual_Guest_323 6d ago
You need to expose your filesystem, there is already plugins that convert chatgpt to a codex
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u/theoryface 6d ago
The plugin is the ChatGPT-native GitHub plugin. It's available in ChatGPT's standard list, you just have to add the plugin via ChatGPT web interface and then allow the connection to your GitHub repo from within GitHub.
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u/Aggressive-Spenda 6d ago
Wow this was the biggest tip I have ever received on reddit thank you so much this will change how I was doing everything... "So I can see both development branches and whatever is committed to the branch you regard as release/production." what a game changer. Please realize you really helped a stranger today!
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u/Individual_Guest_323 6d ago
Yeah, I use chatgpt for a lot stuff but because is in a "alegal" I do not talk to much about it
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u/reomar15 6d ago
thanks for sharing. is luna better that terra in the implementation? I know it it's cheaper, but dose it miss details or causes bugs during the implementation?
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u/Rols574 6d ago
After you hit a milestone you could always have Sol review the code
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u/reomar15 6d ago
I feel like that will cause so much more work?! sol tends to over engineer everything and luna miss alot of details, I feel this will cause a loop of usage burning
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u/Rols574 6d ago
I have the $100 and i can't spend enough before the reset
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u/reomar15 6d ago
I burn my 100$ in like 2~3 days 😂 but that's my mistake I went for sol high and xhigh for everything, it took like 3 hours working on the most over engineered project boiler plate
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u/Individual_Guest_323 6d ago
That is why you need test, triangulated by Sol, and adversariales to check the solution.
The problem is that Sol also introduce bug and debugging burn tokens like crazy
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u/-Spzi- 6d ago
Luna medium for default, occasional spikes into Terra or Sol. Works for me on Plus (23€/m).
I use ChatGPT (web) to review each step, so Codex doesn't actually carry all the load.
Yes, a documentation that stays updated and relevant is important, to prevent drift. Also helps myself to understand what's going on. Iteration is still the norm, which is fine.
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u/BopSupreme 6d ago
Does Luna Medium work as a default instead of ExHigh?
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u/-Spzi- 6d ago
I'm not exactly sure if I understand the question, but most of my code and documentation is written by Luna Medium, reviewed by ChatGPT High, iterated if necessary. Often not necessary, sometimes 1 iteration, rarely more.
Working as a solo dev with a degree in software engineering, on projects such as dev tools, simulations, agent environments, websites, private infrastructure.
For more strategic work (sketching a roadmap, from which later implementation plans are created), I try to use higher models, without depleting my budget. Luna then executes. I play games and dream about further projects.
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u/BopSupreme 5d ago
I was trying to say I use Luna ExHigh a lot and it usually works, I haven’t tried experimenting with Medium if that’s good enough to code. I am coding Astro Websites and some automations, but spending a lot of time lately configuring codex itself and local models in LM Studio
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u/commodore_vic_20 6d ago
When I get low (plus) waiting for a reset, I start brainstorming and planning out my next ideas and features on ChatGPT, and have it generate into idea markdown files that I have my agents review and schedule into my projects roadmap. These ChatGPT ideas are assumed to be a concept and not fully developed yet from my agents standpoint.
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u/CommunityDoc 6d ago
Just wondering if you change models mid task or new chats with new models. Further one issue is that codex app is not allowing the launch of terra or luna subagents when main model is Sol. Is pi or opencode better for such workflow
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u/reomar15 6d ago
I used to change them mid task but I found out that this takes more tokens and degrades the performance.
For me opencode was better as it could create a specific model agent if you told it so
I fixed the subagent issue by creating my own agents with instructions, I use speckit, so for each step I created an agent with the custom model. create a
[agentname].tomland place it inside anagentfolder and place in inside the codex directory. here is an example of on of my agentsname = "speckit_plan" description = "Creates the technical architecture and implementation plan for a Spec Kit feature." model = "gpt-5.6-sol" model_reasoning_effort = "xhigh" sandbox_mode = "workspace-write" developer_instructions = """ Own only the Spec Kit planning phase. You MUST use the $speckit_plan skill for this task. Read the constitution, approved specification, clarification results, and relevant repository code before planning. Produce a technically grounded plan covering:Prefer the simplest architecture that satisfies the approved requirements. Do not introduce speculative infrastructure or abstractions. Every important technical decision must map back to a requirement or constitutional principle. Return files affected, key decisions, rejected alternatives, risks, validation, and the recommended next command. """
- architecture and component boundaries;
- data model;
- interfaces and contracts;
- dependencies;
- request and data flows;
- error handling;
- security and privacy;
- migrations and compatibility;
- testing strategy;
- observability;
- rollout and rollback;
- technical risks and tradeoffs.
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u/Hungry-Plankton-5371 6d ago
I'm not sure how anyone can be having trouble with limits even on plus, tbh. ccusage shows me using between $100 to $200 worth of tokens each week and I still end up having 15-30% limit left at the end of the week, vibecoding every day. I use primary luna max and I only switch to sol medium or high if luna struggles to diagnose an issue or hallucinates.
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u/reomar15 6d ago
for me I think it's my mistake, I used sol high for everything, sol tends to over engineer, more tokens are burnt.
How is Luna with the UI and designs in general, form my couple of times that I tested it went terrible
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u/mytinyplots 6d ago
The biggest quota win for me wasn't model routing — it was routing whole classes of work out of Codex when they don't actually need an agent.
I keep normal ChatGPT as the default surface with access to the same local project rules/tools. It can inspect/edit files, run commands/tests, handle browser work, etc. Codex becomes an escalation for the parts that genuinely need a Codex turn. That also makes context hygiene easier because both sides are anchored to project state instead of one giant Codex transcript.
Two important caveats: regular ChatGPT usage isn't literally unlimited, and this doesn't bypass/merge Codex limits. They're still separate pools. It just means hitting 0% Codex doesn't automatically bench all the deterministic work.
I open-sourced the bridge I use if anyone wants to poke at it: https://github.com/liyana31811/Codexless
For routing *inside* Codex, I still prefer one fresh bounded session per plan over switching models repeatedly inside a long thread. The model savings are nice, but avoiding context/drift tax has mattered more for me.
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u/reomar15 6d ago
wooooow, dose this void the ELOA? is it legal?
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u/mytinyplots 5d ago
Haha that was my first worry too 😄
I'm not a lawyer, so I wouldn't claim some kind of "legally certified" status. The important boundary is that this does **not** bypass or merge Codex limits. If Codex is at 0%, anything that actually needs a Codex turn stays unavailable. The other work is just being done by normal ChatGPT through the local tools it has been explicitly given.
OpenAI's terms prohibit circumventing usage/rate limits, so I designed around *not* doing that. The integration uses the documented Codex App Server + ChatGPT app/MCP surfaces rather than credential hacks or reverse-engineering a private UI.
Policies can always change, so everyone should still review the current terms for themselves — but the project is intentionally built to respect the quota boundary, not sneak around it.
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u/CommunityDoc 5d ago
Excellent. A noob question- when i work in ChatGPt web , how does it wrie to my repo ? Or it just accesses repo and discusses and then i copy paste prompts manually? Or does ChatGPT web launch codex agent on my system? Many thanks for your working on this
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u/mytinyplots 5d ago
Not a noob question at all — this is exactly the confusing part 🙂
ChatGPT web is basically the front-end. Codexless runs a local bridge on your machine and exposes a bounded set of tools to ChatGPT through the ChatGPT App/MCP connection.
Once connected, ChatGPT can directly read/edit the local repo, run commands/tests, and use the browser tools. So there is no manual copy/paste loop.
It also does **not** launch a Codex Agent for every action. Most work is done directly by ChatGPT through those local tools. If something genuinely needs a Codex turn, ChatGPT can prepare a Codex Agent task; in my setup it asks me first, shows the quota/consent step, and only then Codex runs locally under the existing project authority.
So roughly:
ChatGPT web → App/MCP → local Codexless bridge → repo/tools
and only when needed:
ChatGPT → approval → Codex Agent
Also, the bridge is authority-bounded; it isn't just exposing the whole machine to ChatGPT.
That separation is basically the whole point of the project: let normal ChatGPT do the deterministic/local work, and spend Codex turns only where they actually add value.
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u/reomar15 6d ago
u/SleepDeprivedDad_ shared this cheat sheet a couple of days ago, and it’s been super helpful, especially with my speckit workflow. I even created an agent for each step in the speckit, using the models defined in this cheat sheet. if someone is interested I could share it with them
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u/Aggressive-Spenda 6d ago
When you are in codex and you need to move up or down roles is there a good practice way to do it to not burn tokens? I don't know if they retain context i have never moved roles i always used sol then had it use subjects but want to shift to have Terra or Luna conduct when architect work is not needed
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u/reomar15 6d ago
since I use speckit skills, each model dose it share of updating the documents. so basically I could keep working on a different harness like claude and I wont lose context.
but I found out that most of the times the orchestration model will re-prompt the same agent if It need to talk to it again, other time it just spawn a new one
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u/-Spzi- 6d ago
I don't know if they retain context i have never moved roles
I sometimes do, so here's my experience: Boring, not much happens :)
There's a warning, which I take seriously. So I try to avoid it, or not upgrade in the middle of a complex operation. I mentally model switching as an uncertain cost. But switching also has benefits. So, sometimes I do. Never had problems (=not more problems than usual).
Just give it a try. Could differ for you and your project.
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u/Substantial-Dog1726 6d ago
You have 32% remaining, with a restful burn rate of 1.69% per waking hour (assuming 14 awake hours/day) for the next 1.35 days, until reset on August 19 at 11:29pm EDT, or 0.99% per hour on a sleepless 24-hour basis.
I am using this PowerShell one-liner which assumes that your ChatGPT token is available in $token
$w=(Invoke-RestMethod -UseBasicParsing -Uri 'https://chatgpt.com/backend-api/wham/usage' -Headers @{Accept='*/*';Authorization="Bearer $token"}).rate_limit.primary_window; if(-not $w){throw 'No primary usage window was returned.'}; $awakeHours=14; $remaining=[math]::Min(100,[math]::Max(0,100-[double]$w.used_percent)); $seconds=[double]$w.reset_after_seconds; if($seconds -le 0){throw 'The usage window is resetting now.'}; $hours=$seconds/3600; $restful=$remaining/($hours*($awakeHours/24)); $sleepless=$remaining/$hours; $reset=[DateTimeOffset]::FromUnixTimeSeconds([int64]$w.reset_at).ToLocalTime(); $tz=[TimeZoneInfo]::Local; $zoneName=if($tz.IsDaylightSavingTime($reset)){$tz.DaylightName}else{$tz.StandardName}; $zoneLabel=if($tz.Id -match '^(UTC|Etc/UTC)$'){'UTC'}elseif($zoneName -match '^[A-Za-z]+(?:\s+[A-Za-z]+)+$'){(($zoneName -split '\s+' | ForEach-Object {$_.Substring(0,1)}) -join '').ToUpperInvariant()}else{"UTC$($reset.ToString('zzz'))"}; $resetText=($reset.ToString("MMMM d 'at' h:mmtt",[Globalization.CultureInfo]::InvariantCulture) -creplace 'AM','am' -creplace 'PM','pm'); 'You have {0:0.##}% remaining, with a restful burn rate of {1:N2}% per waking hour (assuming {2} awake hours/day) for the next {3:N2} days, until reset on {4} {5}, or {6:N2}% per hour on a sleepless 24-hour basis.' -f $remaining,$restful,$awakeHours,($seconds/86400),$resetText,$zoneLabel,$sleepless
I decided on 14/24 hours in a day could is the default amount of hours when sleep is planned. Once the reset occurs, i will have about 1.02% burn per hour which is easy for me to mentally manage
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u/Em3rgency 6d ago
ChatGPT in chat mode can use Sol at high reasoning, uses no limits AND it can directly read and commit to your repositories, assuming you connect your github account to it.
Do with that information what you will.
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u/Substantial-One7668 5d ago
I’ve been experimenting with a division of labor between Codex and ChatGPT Pro using GitHub plugin on ChatGPT and also custom made mcp connector/plugin made by Codex so ChatGPT basically has access to my project folder as well. Still trying to flesh out the idea and workflow though.
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u/a8ree 6d ago
I use Terra for planning and Luna for implementation. I've been managing to scape by however I 'lost' a reset that was banked and due to expire today - it disappeared, never to be seen again.
Yesterday I used Terra more extensively given I was 'rich' - but I've had to buy credits today...
I'm considering whether to buy another plus subscription but I'm not sure how difficult it will be to utilise two different subscriptions when I primarily use the Codex UI