diff --git a/codex-rs/Cargo.lock b/codex-rs/Cargo.lock
index 558772b76f..96cf1072d9 100644
--- a/codex-rs/Cargo.lock
+++ b/codex-rs/Cargo.lock
@@ -976,7 +976,6 @@ dependencies = [
  "reqwest",
  "serde",
  "serde_json",
- "shell-words",
  "shlex",
  "strum 0.27.2",
  "strum_macros 0.27.2",
@@ -4399,12 +4398,6 @@ dependencies = [
  "lazy_static",
 ]
 
-[[package]]
-name = "shell-words"
-version = "1.1.0"
-source = "registry+https://github.com/rust-lang/crates.io-index"
-checksum = "24188a676b6ae68c3b2cb3a01be17fbf7240ce009799bb56d5b1409051e78fde"
-
 [[package]]
 name = "shlex"
 version = "1.3.0"
diff --git a/codex-rs/tui/Cargo.toml b/codex-rs/tui/Cargo.toml
index 9c990755c6..782861aab8 100644
--- a/codex-rs/tui/Cargo.toml
+++ b/codex-rs/tui/Cargo.toml
@@ -60,7 +60,6 @@ regex-lite = "0.1"
 reqwest = { version = "0.12", features = ["json"] }
 serde = { version = "1", features = ["derive"] }
 serde_json = { version = "1", features = ["preserve_order"] }
-shell-words = "1.1"
 shlex = "1.3.0"
 strum = "0.27.2"
 strum_macros = "0.27.2"
diff --git a/codex-rs/tui/src/bottom_pane/string_utils.rs b/codex-rs/tui/src/bottom_pane/string_utils.rs
index d2cbd968ca..eb3484dbf2 100644
--- a/codex-rs/tui/src/bottom_pane/string_utils.rs
+++ b/codex-rs/tui/src/bottom_pane/string_utils.rs
@@ -9,10 +9,9 @@ pub fn normalize_pasted_path(pasted: &str) -> Option<PathBuf> {
     }
 
     // shell-escaped single path → unescaped
-    if let Ok(mut parts) = shell_words::split(pasted) {
-        if parts.len() == 1 {
-            return Some(PathBuf::from(parts.remove(0)));
-        }
+    let parts: Vec<String> = shlex::Shlex::new(pasted).collect();
+    if parts.len() == 1 {
+        return parts.into_iter().next().map(PathBuf::from);
     }
 
     // simple quoted path fallback