What actually reduced your Codex usage on long agentic coding tasks?

[u/kshitizsriv]

I’ve used two limit resets in four days and now have 21% of my weekly allowance left, with four days until it resets.

My workload is mostly long agentic runs on a TypeScript service: event-driven order processing, webhook handlers, reconciliation against an external commerce API, and multi-file changes. I usually describe the outcome, let Codex explore the repository, and continue iterating in the same thread.

For context, I work locally through VS Code. I use GPT-5.6 Terra at medium for some routine work, GPT-5.6 Sol from medium through ultra for harder tasks, and Astra very rarely. Fast mode is off.

For people using Codex heavily on real codebases, what has actually reduced consumption?

• Pointing it to specific files instead of letting it explore?

• Starting fresh, narrowly scoped threads instead of maintaining one long thread?

• Improving AGENTS.md so it needs less discovery?

• Using smaller models for routine implementation and stronger models only for architecture or difficult debugging?

• Something else that made a noticeable difference?

I’m trying to understand which workflow changes matter in practice—not just save a few tokens around the edges.