> youcanbuildthings.com
tutorials books topics about
Cover of The Codex Migration Playbook

The Codex Migration Playbook

Switch from Claude to Codex. Build 12 Projects. Turn Your New Stack Into Paid Work.

eBook: $9.99 Paperback: $16.99 176 pages
Get on Amazon →

You opened Claude Code this morning and felt it: the tool that used to feel like magic now feels crowded, expensive, and unpredictable. This is the 30-day Codex migration sprint. Day 1: 5-tool stack installed and a real session log on disk. Day 7: deployable SaaS at a live URL with a Stripe test charge. Day 14: a weekly quota tracker that keeps your workflow productive. Day 21: a published Codex Skill. Day 30: twelve shipped projects, a rate card, and a credibility kit you can use to start paid client conversations. Switch the stack. Build the projects. Turn the migration into paid work.

Most AI coding books stop at prompts, CLI setup, and generic productivity advice. This one is built around shipped artifacts: parsers, dashboards, Skills, routing layers, SaaS projects, recovery playbooks, and portfolio pieces that prove you can use Codex in the real world. The goal is not to “learn Codex.” The goal is to migrate with receipts — twelve real projects, a published Skill, a deployed app, a rate card, and the offer you use to start paid client conversations.

What You'll Build

01
The $80/Month Migration

Why r/codex is leaving the $100 Claude plan and what the receipts actually show.

02
How Codex Thinks — Background Compute, Not Chat

The mental model shift: from chatbot to background agent that finishes tasks while you sleep.

03
Pricing Decoded: What "5x Plus" Actually Costs

Six prompts, $15.41. The token math behind Codex Plus, Pro, and the $200 plan — plus a parser that turns your session logs into a dollar ledger.

04
Set Up the 5-Tool Codex Stack

Install commands, real package names, working configs — the stack the 773-upvote thread promised.

05
Ship Your First Real App in 4 Hours

Deployable SaaS at a live URL with a Stripe test charge by hour four.

06
Pick the Model: gpt-5.5, gpt-5.4, gpt-5.4-mini, reasoning effort

Which model for which task and how reasoning-effort routing cuts weekly burn 30-50%.

07
The Real Workflow: Permissions, Skills, Parallel Sessions

Three permission profiles, three parallel sessions, five tickets closed in one sleep cycle.

08
Codex Beyond Coding: Artifacts, Computer Use, Image Gen

Artifacts, gpt-image-2, Computer Use, multi-terminal, SSH into devboxes — Codex as the everything-app.

09
Survive the Weekly Limit: $200 Plan vs API Math

When the $200 plan beats API and how to stay productive at 80% of weekly cap with a quota tracker.

10
Get Paid: Skills, Plugins, Consulting, Hackathons

Publish a Codex Skill, land a consulting gig, win a hackathon — the four monetization paths with a rate card.

11
Failure Modes: The 1M Context Rugpull and Other Lies

OpenAI advertised 400K. Codex Desktop reports 258K. Compaction breaks before 220K. A recovery playbook for the bugs you'll hit.

12
What's Next: AWS, Managed Agents, the Marketplace

A multi-provider routing layer (Codex, Claude, OpenCode, Gemini, OpenClaw, local Qwen) that survives the next pricing shock.