OpenAI's Official Guide: 9 Copy-Ready Codex Prompt Workflows for Fixing Bugs, Turning Screenshots into Prototypes, and Cloud Refactors
- ChatGPT's official prompting guide covers three surfaces: Chat, Work, and Codex.
- The core is a four-element framework: goal, context, output, boundaries. Use what you need — you don't have to fill in every element.
- For Codex, it gives 9 concrete workflows: understanding a codebase, fixing bugs, writing tests, turning a screenshot into a prototype, iterating on UI with live preview, delegating refactors to the cloud, two paths for code review, and updating docs — each with a copy-paste-ready prompt.
- While Codex is running, you can send follow-up messages: steer to redirect the current task mid-run, or queue to save it for the next turn.
- A refactor plan you worked out locally in your IDE can carry its full context straight over to a cloud environment to keep executing.
No template to memorize: four elements, fill in only what matters
OpenAI's team published an official prompting guide at learn.chatgpt.com laying out exactly how to write prompts across three surfaces: Chat, Work, and Codex.
One set of principles unifies how you write for Chat, Work, and Codex, and pairs it with 9 command-level, copy-ready workflows for Codex. A short task just needs a sentence; only big tasks need the full set of elements.
Say what result you want first — don't jump to listing steps
Start from the result you want, spell out the audience and format, and leave the rest — how to search, compare, and adjust — to ChatGPT. Only describe the process itself when the process actually matters.
Turn these meeting notes into a short update for the project team. Put the decisions and next steps first.
Say what the result is for, and it'll pick the right length and detail on its own
The trick with the "output" element: tell ChatGPT how you plan to use the result, and it can choose the right length, level of detail, and structure on its own. For anything that matters, you can also ask for a final check at the end — say, confirming every action item has an owner and a deadline, or flagging anything it couldn't verify — and then review it yourself.
Make this a one-page summary a director can scan before the meeting. Put the decision and next steps first. Turn these notes into a follow-up email with the decisions, owners, and due dates. Create a clear table of planned versus actual spending and highlight any difference over 10%.
Last is the element in the four that's easiest to forget: boundaries.
Boundaries are the instructions that stop ChatGPT from making things worse or acting on its own. The rule of thumb is simple: add one whenever "getting a single detail wrong would make the result unusable," or when "an action affects someone else and you want to review it first." Nail down the one or two that matter most — you don't need to lock down every step.
Keep the approved dates and budget figures unchanged. Use only the supplied sources. Flag missing information instead of guessing. Keep recommendations within the stated budget. Prepare the message as a draft. Don't send it.
Feeding it the right context: files, screenshots, web search, connected apps
"Context" is any information that would change the result. The rule is: give it only relevant sources, and say clearly what to pull from each one. Here are the main ways to feed it context:
| Method | When to use it |
|---|---|
| Upload docs / spreadsheets / slides / PDFs | When you want it to summarize, compare, rewrite, or produce a file you can review |
| Screenshots / diagrams / images | When the task depends on visual information. Add a sentence pointing to the specific part of the image — don't just drop an image with nothing else |
| Web search | When the answer depends on current information. If you need to verify results, also ask it to cite its sources |
| Connected data sources (Drive / Slack, etc.) | Name where to look and what to find — no need to describe every single lookup |
Use the latest project plan in Drive and relevant decisions and updates from the project's Slack channel to prepare a status update.