Copilot CLI 1.0.71 leaves child processes as zombies on Linux
radtka2-mdt · ghdev · 2026-07-17
Bug in Copilot CLI 1.0.71 leaves child processes unreaped
A GitHub issue reports that copilot-cli 1.0.71 fails to reap finished subprocesses on Linux. The exited children remain as zombies (state=Z) under the Copilot PID, so each tool call can leak processes over time.
Reported impact
- Commands that have already exited are still shown as “still running” until manually stopped.
- Command completion becomes slow and unreliable.
- Zombie counts rise independently per session; the reporter saw 8, 79, and 135 zombies across three concurrent sessions.
Reproduction
- Start copilot and run any prompt that spawns subprocesses.
- Wait for the command to finish.
- Check ps for Z processes parented to the Copilot PID.
- The CLI continues to treat the finished child as running indefinitely.
The reporter notes the issue is not NFS/fsync latency: the affected children have already exited (wchan=0) and are only cleared when the owning Copilot process exits.
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