[Windows] Agent terminal: commands hang / no stdout — integrated terminal works

Support Bug Reports
, ,
1

Describe the Bug

Where does the bug appear?

Cursor IDE — Agent / Composer shell tool (background terminal).
Integrated terminal works fine.

Environment

  • OS: Windows 10/11, build [e.g. 10.0.29595]
  • Cursor: [Help → About → version, e.g. 3.6.33]
  • Shell (integrated): PowerShell 7.6.2 (C:\Program Files\PowerShell\7\pwsh.exe)
  • Workspace: W:\WINX (also tested from C:\Users\charl)
  • Release track: was dev, now default
  • Legacy Terminal Tool: tried ON and OFF (both failed)

Describe the bug

When the agent runs any shell command (even echo cursor-terminal-test), the command does not return stdout/stderr to the agent. The background terminal log shows only metadata (pid, cwd, command, running_for_ms) — no output and often no exit_code. Commands time out (~15–25s) and get backgrounded.

The same command in Terminal → New Terminal returns instantly.

Actual behavior

  • Agent: hang or background after timeout; empty output

  • Agent terminal log example:

    ---
pid: 27092
cwd: "W:\\WINX"
command: "echo cursor-terminal-test"
running_for_ms: 25107
---

Steps to Reproduce

  1. Open Cursor on Windows with any workspace (e.g. W:\WINX).
  2. In Agent / Chat, ask: Run echo cursor-terminal-test
  3. Observe the agent’s background terminal: hollow/running indicator, no output.
  4. Open integrated terminal (pwsh), run: echo cursor-terminal-test
  5. Compare: integrated prints cursor-terminal-test immediately; agent never captures output.

Expected Behavior

Agent shell tool runs the command, returns stdout (cursor-terminal-test) and exit code 0 within ~1 second.

Operating System

Windows 10/11

Version Information

Version: 3.6.33 (system setup)
VS Code Extension API: 1.105.1
Commit: 453f0b5a181a2308f4194369774059e533143520
Date: 2026-06-01T01:43:45.348Z
Layout: editor
Build Type: Stable
Release Track: Default
Electron: 39.8.1
Chromium: 142.0.7444.265
Node.js: 22.22.1
V8: 14.2.231.22-electron.0
xterm.js: 6.1.0-beta.220
OS: Windows_NT x64 10.0.29595

For AI issues: which model did you use?

Auto…

Does this stop you from using Cursor

Sometimes - I can sometimes use Cursor

image
image351×142 3.05 KB

image

7

This is a known bug affecting the agent’s shell tool on Windows. The agent’s terminal execution path uses a different mechanism than the integrated terminal, and on Windows it can fail to capture command output - producing exactly the behavior you’re seeing (command starts but no stdout/stderr is returned).

Our engineering team is actively investigating this across several enterprise customers. No reliable workaround exists at this time unfortunately, though a few things you could try as a shot in the dark:

  1. Switch the default terminal profile to Command Prompt (cmd.exe) instead of PowerShell, then retry the agent

  2. Add this to your settings.json:

“terminal.integrated.shellIntegration.enabled”: false

Neither is guaranteed to help, but some users have had intermittent improvement with option 1.

You may also find this related thread useful — another Windows user reporting the same issue with active discussion.

I’m merging your thread into the existing one so all reports are consolidated. We’ll post an update there once a fix ships.