VS Code Agent mode hangs with spinner after terminal command completes
VS Code 1.99.0-insider on Windows 11 with Copilot Chat Extension 0.26.2025040201: in Agent mode, asking for any action that runs a command, like "build the project", executes the command in the terminal but the chat spinner never stops and the result is never returned. Is this a known issue and is there a workaround?
Originally asked on GitHub: https://github.com/microsoft/vscode/issues/254447
4 answers
Status: the GitHub issue is closed as completed, but this thread does not identify a maintainer-confirmed fix or a fixed version. The symptom is that the terminal command executes and finishes, but the chat never receives the result and the spinner keeps rotating. A contributor suspected the extension was not detecting that the command had finished and asked the reporter whether custom terminal settings were present, especially terminal.integrated.windowsEnableConpty and terminal.integrated.windowsUseConptyDll. The reporter confirmed there were no terminal.* entries in the Code Insiders settings.json, so that path did not resolve the case. Another user reproduced the same hang with a basic command that completed successfully. The only user who reported an improvement said they had been seeing the PowerShell warning "PowerShell detected that you might be using a screen reader and has disabled PSReadLine for compatibility purposes." They fixed that warning and rebooted, but were not sure whether the fix or the reboot resolved it. No official workaround was given in this thread. As general advice, if you hit this, make sure your terminal settings are standard and eliminate PowerShell startup warnings before restarting VS Code, but treat that as an unverified suggestion, not a confirmed fix.
Did this work for you?What a GitHub user tried on GitHub (Didn't work)
Reproduced by asking Agent mode to "build the project" and clicking Continue; the command was shown and ran in the terminal, but the chat kept an indefinitely rotating spinner with no result.
Source: https://github.com/microsoft/vscode/issues/254447 (opens external site)
Did this work for you?What @Tyriar tried on GitHub (Outcome unclear)
A contributor asked the reporter to check terminal.* settings, especially terminal.integrated.windowsEnableConpty and terminal.integrated.windowsUseConptyDll; the reporter had no terminal-related settings in the Code Insiders settings.json.
Source: https://github.com/microsoft/vscode/issues/254447#issuecomment-3045399941 (opens external site)
Did this work for you?What @timmhayes tried on GitHub (Outcome unclear)
A commenter with the same issue fixed a PowerShell PSReadLine screen reader warning and rebooted; they said they had been seeing the issue until then but were unsure whether the fix or the reboot caused the improvement.
Source: https://github.com/microsoft/vscode/issues/254447#issuecomment-3045399968 (opens external site)
Did this work for you?