Automations

Source: OpenAI Blog

Overview

Codex can automatically run tasks on a schedule, making it proactive. Instead of waiting for you to ask for an update, Codex can return at the scheduled time, perform the work, and surface the result for you to review.

Use Cases

This is useful for recurring work such as:

• Preparing for the day
• Reviewing what changed
• Checking for updates
• Summarizing recent activity
• Creating a weekly report

Example Automations

You might use a thread automation to:

• Write a weekly review every Friday
• Create a morning brief from yesterday’s work
• Summarize new files added to a folder
• Clean up a weekly data export
• Check for missing or inconsistent information
• Create a recurring project status update

Contextual Continuation

Some automations can return to the same conversation and continue from the existing context. This is especially useful when you want Codex to pick up an ongoing task instead of starting fresh each time.

Best Practices

A good automation is:

• Specific
• Repeatable
• Easy to review

Example

Note

If you’re running Codex locally, automations work best when your laptop is awake and Codex is running.

Getting Started

Start by chatting back and forth with Codex to zero in on the exact behavior and output you need. Once Codex understands your requirements, turn that task into an automation.