Using banked Codex usage resets

In July 2026, I used one of the promotional rate-limit resets available in Codex's /usage menu. My usage went from 79% to 0%, and my balance dropped from four reset credits to three.

The credits came from a limited promotion, so this describes the behaviour I used at the time. They replenished an allowance; they weren't a different subscription tier or a permanent increase to my plan.

#Where the reset credits came from

OpenAI's June promotion terms allowed eligible Plus and Pro users to invite up to three friends between 11 and 24 June 2026. When an eligible recipient sent their first Codex message, both people received a banked reset. Each credit was usable for 30 days after it was granted.

I had four available: a launch reset and three from referrals. The Codex changelog covered the launch, and the redemption menu showed the credits and their individual expiry times.

#Redeem a reset from the usage menu

I had just run a task that lasted 1 day, 5 hours and 51 minutes. CodexBar showed 79% usage with a fire indicator, which meant I was ahead of a steady pace through the active usage window.

I opened /usage, chose Redeem usage limit reset, selected one of the four credits, and confirmed. Codex then cleared the current usage balance, leaving three credits available.

The screenshot walkthrough shows the menu, confirmation, expiry information, and resulting balance. Its screenshots have identifying details redacted.

The fireworks at the end came from CodexBar, not Codex. I added optional reset celebrations to make that change noticeable while I'm working. CodexBar also keeps the usage percentage and next reset time in the menu bar. ClaudeBar provides similar visibility for Claude Code.

#How much extra usage a reset provides

OpenAI described the Pro allowances as 5x or 20x the usage of Plus. At the time of this example, Tibo Sottiaux had said that the five-hour limit was switched off and that the banked resets replenished weekly usage.

Using a complete allowance and then redeeming one full reset would let you use two allowances before the normal rollover. That is where the informal 10x and 40x comparisons came from: two 5x allowances or two 20x allowances. Four fully used resets on the 20x tier could add another 80x to the original 20x, provided you had time to use all of it before the credits expired and before normal rollovers made the comparison irrelevant.

Those are allowance comparisons, not guaranteed amounts of work. They also assume the first allowance was fully consumed. I redeemed at 79%, so I hadn't used two complete allowances, and I couldn't treat the reset as a subscription upgrade.

#Timing the credit

The normal weekly rollover still happened on schedule. Redeeming just before it would provide little extra time to use the replenished allowance. The useful case was being close to the limit, having several days until the normal reset, and having work ready to use the credit before it expired.

OpenAI also issued global resets independently of banked credits. A community tracker collected those announcements. An unexpected global reset could clear the usage I was planning to replace while leaving my banked credit untouched, so there was no reliable way to optimise the timing perfectly.

For my session, the result was straightforward: one credit restored the available allowance and I could continue working. Before using a credit, check both its expiry and the scheduled reset time. The account's usage screen shows the current availability and limits.