"Your usage does not need a reset right now": Codex resets explained
You saved a free reset for a bad week, pressed Use reset, and Codex said "Your usage does not need a reset right now." That isn't a glitch, most of the time. It's a rule on OpenAI's help page, and once you know the number, the message makes sense.
Why Codex says your usage doesn't need a reset
A banked reset refills your allowances to 100%. If all of them are still at 80% or more, OpenAI won't spend a reset to top up a few percent, so you get the message and the reset stays in your list. It isn't used up, and its expiry date doesn't change.
That catches out people who check the meter, see 85% or 87%, and expect the reset to work because they're below 100%. Below 100% isn't enough; it has to be below 80%. On plans with both a 5-hour and a weekly limit, either one counts, so a nearly used 5-hour window is enough even when the week looks fine.
There's a second, stricter number if you let Codex spend resets for you. With Allow your assistant to use resets turned on in the desktop app, Codex only redeems one when your main 5-hour or weekly allowance has 10% or less left.
How to use a banked reset in Codex
- Open UsageIn the ChatGPT desktop app it's Settings, then Usage & billing. On the web it's Settings, then Usage. The iPhone and Android apps don't have it yet.
- Check your plan limitsAt least one meter needs to show less than 80% left. If they're all above, wait.
- Choose Use resetUnder Usage limit resets, the Available tab lists each reset with its expiry. Review what it covers and confirm.
In the Codex CLI, type /usage and choose Redeem reset. If your version doesn't offer it, use the desktop app or the web. On the desktop, don't confuse Use reset with Buy an instant reset beside the meter: that one is the paid offer, and buying it doesn't touch your banked resets.
What a full reset restores
A full banked reset refills the main Codex allowance on your plan, and only the parts below 100%:
| Plan | What a full reset refills |
|---|---|
| Go | The monthly allowance |
| Plus, Business Standard | The 5-hour and weekly allowances |
| Pro 100, 200 and 500 | The weekly allowance |
It counts as used only if it actually refills something. An allowance already at 100% isn't restarted, which is why the 5-hour and weekly periods can drift apart: you might have the full week left and 10% of your 5-hour window, and a reset then refills just the 5-hour part. Image generation, file uploads and voice have their own limits and stay as they are.
A reset that restarts a period also moves its next refresh. After using one, read the new time on the Usage page; a changed date on its own doesn't mean a second reset was spent. History, on the desktop only, shows the last 30 days of resets received and used.
Free, automatic and paid resets
OpenAI hands out three kinds, and they behave differently:
- Banked resets are free, saved on your account, and used when you choose, before they expire. Referral rewards arrive this way too.
- Automatic resets, sometimes called global resets, are free and applied for you. They never show up in your list or in History, and "global" doesn't mean every account got one.
- Paid instant resets are offered to some Plus and Pro personal accounts, from Buy an instant reset or a banner once you hit the weekly limit. They apply at once, even with usage left, can't be saved, restart your week from your next request, and generally aren't refunded.
If you just need to keep working this week, usage credits are the other option: they kick in after your included limit runs out instead of moving your week.
When a reset is about to expire
This is where the rule hurts. On 22 October two Codex users reported on GitHub that their resets were refused right before they expired, one at about 95% left and one at 83 to 87%, and then disappeared unused. Both are still open. By the rule on OpenAI's page, both refusals were expected, since neither was below 80%; the second report also suspects the check lags after a global reset. Either way, OpenAI's page says support won't replace a free reset that expired.
So treat a banked reset as something for a heavy week, not a bonus to cash in. Look at the expiry dates on your Usage page now, and if one runs out soon, plan your bigger Codex job before it, so the meter is under 80% when you need the reset. The GPT-6 Astra jobs are the ones that eat a week fastest, and new limits and resets go into our AI feature tracker as OpenAI announces them.
One thing a reset can't give back is where a long session had got to when the limit hit. I make Pinto Notes, a notes app for Mac, and keeping a short running note that Codex reads and updates means a new session picks up where the old one stopped. Notes in Claude Code and Codex shows the one-command setup.
Questions
Does a Codex reset give me more usage than my plan?
No. A reset refills an allowance to 100%, and only the ones that need it. It doesn't raise your plan's limits, and two resets close together don't add up to 200%. A paid reset pulls next week's allowance forward rather than adding extra.
Do resets affect normal ChatGPT chats?
No. The Usage page says the plan limits are shared across Codex, Work, Workspace Agents and ChatGPT for Excel, and that chat conversations aren't included. Separate limits such as image generation, file uploads and voice aren't touched by a reset either.
Can I use a banked reset on my iPhone?
No. The ChatGPT mobile app doesn't have the reset controls or the History list yet. Use the desktop app, Usage settings on the web, or /usage in the Codex CLI.
Can OpenAI support give me back a reset that expired?
OpenAI's help page says no: support doesn't extend expiry dates, replace free resets that expired or were used by accident, or hand out courtesy resets. Paid resets are handled separately, through billing support.
Why did my weekly reset day change?
Any reset that restarts a usage period moves its next refresh. If your weekly period was due on Friday and a reset restarts it on Tuesday, the next refresh is the following Tuesday. Check the time on the Usage page rather than counting days yourself.
Checked against the app on .
