Codex

🚀OpenAI releases Codex cloud-based programming agent!

🧠What exactly is Codex?

OpenAI recently released a heavyweight AI tool, Codex Cloud Programming Agent. It's not just a code-completion tool, it's an AI programming partner** with “autonomous capabilities”!

Unlike Cursor and Windsurf, which are AI assistants integrated in IDEs, Codex is positioned as an AI-led, developer-assisted tool**. It can independently undertake the entire development process, such as writing, debugging, testing, optimization. Rather than “using” it, it's more like collaborating with a super-intelligent programmer.

🔍There are two ways to use Codex:

• Codex CLI: Runs in a local terminal, for advanced users to get up to speed.
• Codex Cloud Agent: based on OpenAI server, with virtual sandbox isolation function, can process multiple tasks in parallel, avoiding any local environment risk.

The big model behind 🧬: Codex-1

Codex uses OpenAI's latest model Codex-1, a version specially optimized for software development based on the o3 model, with:

• a highly human-like code style
• Strong comprehension and reasoning capabilities
• support for contexts up to 192K tokens to easily handle large projects

An accuracy rate of up to 75% in OpenAI's internal software engineering task (SWE-Bench). In other words, it can autonomously fix 3/4 of the bugs, auto-test and auto iterate, greatly reducing human intervention.

🛠What can Codex do?

• Auto-development feature: develop modules based on your instructions, and even proactively submit them to GitHub.
• Intelligent bug finding and fixing: it fixes bugs without you having to point out where they are.
• Automated Code Testing: write tests, execute them, and fix them, in a fully automated closed loop.
• In-depth understanding of project structure: can read the entire code base and answer any project-related questions.
• Multi-task parallel processing: handle multiple Issue, PR at the same time, greatly improve the development efficiency.

📲How to use Codex?

Currently, it is only open to ChatGPT Pro/Enterprise/Team users. Plus users are not yet open, but it is expected that the permissions will be gradually liberalized subsequently.

Basic process:

1. Open ChatGPT left menu bar and go to Codex.
2. Bind your GitHub account. 3.
3. Select or import a project repository. 4.
4. Select a task mode (e.g., explain project, fix bugs, etc.). 5.
5. AI enters the sandbox environment to execute the task and generate change suggestions. 6.
6. The user confirms and commits to GitHub with one click.

✨ It even supports initiate tasks and view progress on mobile, realizing the real “couch office”.

💰Codex Charging Methods

There is no separate pricing for Codex, and it is only included in ChatGPT Pro ($20/month) and above**. Enterprise Edition users can get access to more features based on the customization services offered by OpenAI.

📈Codex Benefits Review

Experience in a nutshell:

• Interactions are natural and smooth, with almost no learning costs;
• The code is of high quality and conforms to modern development norms;
• Test auto-fixes are surprising;
• Multitasking ability greatly releases development efficiency;
• The only drawback is: the current lack of support for local private projects (GitHub public or authorized private repositories only).

🧭Codex vs Cursor and more

🧩 Recommended alternative tools:

• [Cursor](https://tophub.ai/item/cursor “Cursor”): a lightweight IDE AI assistant built on GPT-4-turbo with native code reasoning support.
• Continue.dev: open source AI assistant development plugin for VS Code.
• Github Copilot X: official development assistant for GitHub ecosystem users.
• CodeWhisperer (AWS): for AWS developers, provides code suggestions and security analysis.

📣 Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ)

**Q: Does Codex support private codebases? ** A: Currently Codex operates mainly through a bound GitHub account, and private repositories require authorized access. Enterprise customers can contact OpenAI for custom integration.

**Q: Which developers is Codex suitable for? **Q: What kind of developers is Codex suitable for? A: For professional developer teams, AI development labs, and large-scale project maintainers. It is also very friendly to independent developers and can greatly reduce duplication of effort.

**Q: Can it handle multilingual projects? ** A: Yes, Codex has multi-language understanding (Python, JavaScript, Go, Java, etc. are all supported).

✍️TopHub Review:

Codex is not a simple AI code-completion tool, but an “AI development partner” with full-process development capabilities. It breaks the limitations of traditional IDE plug-ins and brings AI into a new era of automated collaborative development.

For technical teams that want to integrate AI capabilities into DevOps and full-stack development processes, Codex is a real “leap in efficiency”.