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If Kiro CLI becomes sluggish during a long session, first determine whether the delay is in the terminal UI, model responses, approvals, or a separate long-running process. Kiro’s documentation provides diagnostics for gathering evidence, but available reports do not establish one universal cause or permanent fix. A TUI restart reportedly helped one macOS user temporarily; treat that as a reset to test, not a confirmed solution.
First identify what is slowing down
“Kiro is slow” can describe different symptoms in different products and modes. A laggy terminal interface is not the same issue as a slow model response, delayed command approval, or memory growth in a long-running background process. Note which one you see before changing settings or comparing your experience with an issue report.
- CLI TUI: the interactive terminal interface is slow to redraw or respond to input.
- Model or network: the UI remains responsive, but requests take longer to complete.
- Command approval: the delay occurs when approving commands, as described in a separate Windows report.
- ACP process: a long-running process using ACP/stdio JSON-RPC shows memory growth; this is distinct from ordinary interactive CLI use.
Keep the platform and exact Kiro version with the symptom. The reports discussed below concern different surfaces and should not be treated as one confirmed bug.
Run Kiro’s documented checks
- Run
kiro-cli doctor. Follow its prompts; Kiro’s setup guidance says the command checks for and fixes common issues. - Check connectivity and environment support. Confirm that the machine has the required connectivity and that your environment is supported, as described in Kiro’s CLI setup documentation.
- Inspect the CLI log. The documented default locations are macOS
$TMPDIR/kiro-log/kiro-chat.log, Linux$XDG_RUNTIME_DIR/kiro-log/kiro-chat.log, and Windows%TEMP%/kiro-log/logs/kiro-chat.log. SetKIRO_CHAT_LOG_FILEto override the log-file path. If the expected file is absent, check the environment variables and whether the CLI has written a log for that session. - Check session context. In a CLI chat, use
/context showto review included files and their share of the context window. Remove unneeded items with/context remove, or use/context clearto clear session context; add items again with/context addwhen needed. The chat documentation explains these commands, and the settings reference describes automatic compaction and context-window-related settings. - Report a persistent problem. Capture the details in the checklist below, then use
kiro-cli issueto report an unresolved CLI issue, following Kiro’s setup guidance.
What context changes can—and cannot—tell you
Context files consume tokens on each request, so reviewing and trimming unnecessary context can make a session easier to manage. Kiro’s documentation also distinguishes temporary session context from persistent agent resources. But the documentation does not say that excess context causes a progressively sluggish TUI, and the user reports do not confirm that connection. Treat context cleanup as a way to inspect and control what the session carries, not as a proven cure for interface degradation.
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What the extended-use reports actually describe
macOS CLI TUI report
A GitHub reporter using Kiro CLI 1.28.1 on macOS 26.3 described the TUI becoming less responsive over a session. The reporter observed high CPU percentages and RSS in the approximate range of 155–162 MB, and said restarting the TUI temporarily restored responsiveness. Those figures are observations from that individual report, not general performance measurements. The reporter speculated about rendering or context accumulation, but that is not a maintainer-confirmed diagnosis. Although the issue page is shown as closed, it also carries a pending-maintainer-response label; closure alone does not establish that a fix was confirmed. See the macOS TUI report.
Windows app report
A separate report describes Kiro for Windows version 0.8.0 becoming increasingly slow to approve commands after about five hours, followed by an unresponsive window. It concerns the Windows app behavior in that report, not the macOS CLI TUI case. See the Windows report.
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When a restart is useful
If the CLI TUI itself has become unresponsive, restarting it is a practical way to test whether a fresh process restores responsiveness. One macOS reporter said it helped temporarily, but that is a single user observation—not a verified permanent fix. Before restarting, save or copy any work that is not already preserved. If the problem returns, record how long the session ran and whether the delay returns gradually or immediately.
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Capture a useful troubleshooting record
Before filing an issue—or when comparing behavior across sessions—write down:
- Exact Kiro CLI version and operating system, including OS version.
- Whether the affected surface is CLI TUI, desktop app, or ACP process, and the mode used.
- What specifically lags: rendering or input, model/network response, command approval, or process behavior.
- Approximate session length before symptoms begin and whether a fresh session changes them.
- Context contents or size as shown by
/context show, if applicable. - CPU and resident-memory observations, with the process and time of observation identified.
- Relevant log details and whether
kiro-cli doctorreported or corrected anything.
This separates an observable symptom from a suspected cause and gives Kiro a more actionable report through kiro-cli issue.
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