codex - 💡(How to fix) Fix Browser Use and Chrome backend time out despite installed extension and valid native host [1 comments, 2 participants]

Summary

Codex Desktop Browser Use appears unable to connect to either the in-app browser (iab) or the Chrome extension backend. Both paths time out at the browser-client connection/listing stage.

This looks like a Browser Use/native pipe runtime issue rather than a Chrome extension installation issue.

Environment

• OS: macOS
• Chrome: 147.0.7727.139
• Codex Chrome Extension: 1.1.4
• Extension ID: hehggadaopoacecdllhhajmbjkdcmajg
• Codex Desktop app: 26.506.31421

What I checked

Chrome side appears healthy:

• Google Chrome is installed and running.
• Codex Chrome Extension is installed and enabled in the Default profile.
• Native Messaging Host manifest exists and points to: /Users/timmy/.codex/plugins/cache/openai-bundled/chrome/latest/extension-host/macos/arm64/extension-host
• Manifest allowed_origins matches: chrome-extension://hehggadaopoacecdllhhajmbjkdcmajg/
• The native extension-host process starts and opens a socket under: /tmp/codex-browser-use/*.sock

Browser plugin side was also restored/verified:

• [plugins."browser-use@openai-bundled"] enabled = true
• Browser plugin cache exists at: /Users/timmy/.codex/plugins/cache/openai-bundled/browser-use/0.1.0-alpha2

Actual behavior

Both browser backends fail:

• agent.browsers.list() times out.
• In-app browser (iab) does not become usable.
• Chrome backend also times out and cannot list tabs.

In Node REPL, import.meta.__codexNativePipe is undefined, even though request metadata advertises available browser backends:

"x-codex-browser-use-available-backends": ["chrome", "iab"]

Expected behavior

Codex should be able to initialize Browser Use and return available browser backends via browsers.list(), then connect to either the in-app browser or Chrome extension backend.

Notes

This may be related to the Browser Use / Chrome extension feature being new. The symptoms suggest the extension and native host are installed correctly, but the Codex Desktop runtime is not injecting or wiring the native pipe needed by browser-client.