A Little Pet Appears on ChatGPT Desktop? It’s Not Just Cute – It Tells You What the AI Is Doing

You open the ChatGPT desktop app and notice a small critter waving at you from the bottom right corner.

It’s not an ad, nor an Easter egg. It’s a feature launched by OpenAI in May 2026: Codex Pets.

Yes, it’s adorable. But it’s actually a work status indicator – telling you what task the AI is running in the background, whether it’s stuck, and if you need to step in.

What Exactly Is It?

Codex Pets are floating mascot characters inside the ChatGPT desktop app that show the status of Codex (an AI coding assistant).

Codex itself is OpenAI’s AI agent tool that can help you write code, read code, fix bugs, and handle technical tasks – the whole process runs in the background and takes some time, it’s not instant.

During that time, how do you know what the AI is up to?

You used to just stare at a progress bar. Now a little pet watches for you, using its actions to tell you:

When multiple tasks are running simultaneously, the priority order is: needs your decision > stuck > completed awaiting review > running.

8 Built-in Pets, One Named Codey

Currently, there are 8 built-in pets. The first one officially named by OpenAI is Codey.

The pet is just an appearance – it doesn’t affect Codex’s working ability. Switching to a different pet doesn’t change how the AI runs tasks.

If you have the system’s “Reduce motion” accessibility setting turned on, the pet automatically becomes a static image with no animations.

Where to Enable It

Desktop App:

• Click your Profile avatar in the top right → select Pets

• Or go to Settings → Pets

• Or type /pet in the command bar; the pet will appear as a floating overlay

Type /pet again or go back to Settings to dismiss it.

Web version (chatgpt.com):

• Go to Settings → Personalization → Pet

• Choose from the built-in options

Note: On the web version, the pet doesn’t float. It only appears in supported task views, not as a full-screen overlay.

How to Create Your Own Custom Pet

This is the most fun part of the feature.

You can describe a pet in natural language, and the AI will generate it for you.

Steps:

• Go to Settings → Pets → “Create your own pet”

• The system automatically installs a skill called hatch-pet and starts a new task

• Describe the look you want in natural language

• The AI generates a sprite sheet

• Once the task is complete, go back to Settings → Pets, click Refresh, and your new pet appears

The pet is stored locally and won’t automatically sync to the web version.

Prompt Template (Ready to Use)

When describing a pet, you can follow this structure:

A [appearance/animal type], [color scheme],
capable of actions like [wave/doze/zone out/glow],
style reference: [pixel art / flat cartoon / skeuomorphic],
overall feel: [cute / cool / minimalist / retro].

Some tested directions:

A chubby orange cat with a creamy white belly,
able to wave a paw, curl up to sleep, and spin around,
pixel art style, overall simple and cute.

A little detective holding a magnifying glass, dark blue with beige,
able to examine clues, tap its head, and raise its hand to report,
flat cartoon style.

A blue and white little owl with round eyes,
able to nod, blink, and fly in a circle,
minimalist line art style.

The Most Popular Community Pet: Lil Finder Guy

In May 2026, Zac Hall, a reporter for tech media 9to5Mac, used Codex Pets to create a blue and white character modeled after the macOS Finder icon.

He named it Lil Finder Guy.

This pet became so popular that it even appeared in Apple’s WWDC 2026 event merchandise.

His original words:

“Here’s to the tiny ones. The square pegs in the dock… little helpers who wave, wobble, nap, and somehow make the work feel lighter.”

“向那些小家伙致敬。浮在 Dock 上的方块们……挥手、摇晃、打盹,不知为什么就让工作变得轻松了。”

This incident itself illustrates the positioning of Codex Pets: not complex functionally, but it changes the way you feel about working with AI tools.

A Few Notes

Requires a ChatGPT Plus subscription (or higher tier); the free version cannot use Codex.

Terminal version has additional requirements:

• Requires iTerm2 3.6+ or a terminal that supports the Kitty graphics protocol

• Not supported inside tmux or Zellij

• Commands: /pets to open the selector, /pets off to close

Want to find pets created by others:

There’s an unofficial pet gallery site: petdex.crafter.run, where you can download pets created by other users.

Custom images (upload via web version):

If you have your own design, the format requirements are: transparent PNG or WebP, 1536 x 1872 pixels, max 20MB.

Summary

Codex Pets aren’t there for you to play games. They’re there so you don’t have to stare at the screen while the AI runs background tasks.

A little critter acts as your status monitor: waving means it’s running, zoning out means waiting for you, glowing means it’s done, sighing means something went wrong.

And along the way, you can generate a custom pet using natural language and have it keep you company on your desktop.

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