Local agents fail to start while Cloud Agents work fine

Support Bug Reports
1

Where does the bug appear (feature/product)?

Cursor IDE

Describe the Bug

when speaking to agents the majority of the time im not getting any response, it just sits there hung up. Theres maybe 25% chance that the agent will respond.

Steps to Reproduce

I start speaking to a new agent (local) and sometimes it goes through and most times it just gets hung up. Cloud agents are working for me though.

Expected Behavior

usually i see responses

Operating System

MacOS

Version Information

Version: 3.18.25
VS Code Extension API: 1.128.0
Commit: 280eca2911f1774689696e5f1efa5a4f97a87af0
Date: 2026-08-31T23:08:02.261Z
Layout: IDE
Build Type: Stable
Release Track: Default
Electron: 40.10.3
Chromium: 144.0.7559.236
Node.js: 24.15.0
V8: 14.4.258.32-electron.0
xterm.js: 6.1.0-beta.291
OS: Darwin arm64 25.5.0

For AI issues: which model did you use?

tried multiple, cursor grok 4.6 / composer 2.5 / sonnet / opus / gpt 5.6

For AI issues: add Request ID with privacy disabled

Request ID: 998eb987-d43f-42d5-98ae-24f3aee541bc
Agent turn stopped after repeated resume attempts made no progress
RetriableError: Agent turn stopped after repeated resume attempts made no progress
at _kf (vscode-file://vscode-app/Applications/Cursor.app/Contents/Resources/app/out/vs/workbench/workbench.desktop.main.js:8032:6408)
at async Sqs.run (vscode-file://vscode-app/Applications/Cursor.app/Contents/Resources/app/out/vs/workbench/workbench.desktop.main.js:8032:17165)
at async vce.runAgentLoop (vscode-file://vscode-app/Applications/Cursor.app/Contents/Resources/app/out/vs/workbench/workbench.desktop.main.js:8132:34413)
at async rRo.streamFromAgentBackend (vscode-file://vscode-app/Applications/Cursor.app/Contents/Resources/app/out/vs/workbench/workbench.desktop.main.js:17489:17224)
at async rRo.getAgentStreamResponse (vscode-file://vscode-app/Applications/Cursor.app/Contents/Resources/app/out/vs/workbench/workbench.desktop.main.js:17489:36143)
at async YIe._submitChatMaybeAbortCurrent (vscode-file://vscode-app/Applications/Cursor.app/Contents/Resources/app/out/vs/workbench/workbench.desktop.main.js:8110:4529)
at async YIe.submitChatMaybeAbortCurrent (vscode-file://vscode-app/Applications/Cursor.app/Contents/Resources/app/out/vs/workbench/workbench.desktop.main.js:8105:67958)
at async hi (vscode-file://vscode-app/Applications/Cursor.app/Contents/Resources/app/out/vs/workbench/workbench.desktop.main.js:14170:93636)

Additional Information

I have tried reloading the window and uninstalling and reinstalling but nothing has worked so far.

Does this stop you from using Cursor

Sometimes - I can sometimes use Cursor

5

Hey @rooiiss, thanks for the detailed report and the Request ID.

I checked this request on our side. The model replied in just a couple of seconds and asked to run a command and search for files, but Cursor on your Mac never finished those local steps. That’s why the chat stayed waiting and then eventually timed out. This also explains why Cloud Agents work, since their tools run on a cloud machine, not on your Mac. So we need to find what’s hanging locally. Please try the following and tell me what you see:

  1. Fully quit Cursor Cmd+Q and open it again.
  2. Open a new small folder (an empty one is fine too) and start a new chat in Agent mode with any model.
  3. Ask: “List the files in this folder” and wait about 60 seconds.
  4. Describe what the chat shows: nothing at all, the “Thinking” indicator, or a step like “Ran command” / “Searched files” that spins forever.
  5. Open Cursor Settings, find “defaultProfile.osx”, set “Terminal › Integrated › Default Profile: Osx” to bash, fully restart Cursor, and repeat step 3. Does anything change?
  6. Also, when you open a new Terminal window on your Mac, does your shell print anything on startup (welcome banners, version or update messages, oh-my-zsh output)?

Please attach a fresh Request ID from the chat that got stuck after these steps chat menu in the top right > Copy Request ID. That should help pinpoint which local step is hanging.

A similar case is discussed here for context: Agent hangs indefinitely

6

I just wanted to update you that I followed your instructions and the problem disappeared.

The steps I followed were:

  1. Fully quit Cursor Cmd+Q and opened it again.
  2. Opened a new chat in Agent mode, asked “List the files in this folder” and wait about 60 seconds.
  3. Opened Cursor Settings in IDE window, found “Terminal: Select Default Profile” and then selected “bash”.
  4. Fully restarted Cursor, and repeated step 2. It magically worked!

Do you know what was the problem? Just for be more aware of what happened.

The request ID of the running chat: e173c1bf-4bd6-49d8-a741-42fd930fbade

Thanks again for your help!!

Chiara