diff --git a/src/config.test.ts b/src/config.test.ts
index 6c68801e1..0312a28e4 100644
--- a/src/config.test.ts
+++ b/src/config.test.ts
@@ -2061,6 +2061,58 @@ describe("refreshLiveProviderCatalog", () => {
   });
 });
 
+describe("catalog credential-removal convergence", () => {
+  const resolved: ResolvedProvider = {
+    providerName: "fp",
+    baseURL: "https://fp/v1",
+    apiKey: "fp-key",
+    model: "fp-large",
+  };
+  const credentialed: Settings = {
+    providers: {
+      fp: { baseURL: "https://fp/v1", apiKey: "fp-key", models: ["fp-large"] },
+    },
+  };
+  const credentialRemoved: Settings = {
+    providers: {
+      fp: { baseURL: "https://fp/v1", models: ["fp-large"] },
+    },
+  };
+
+  test("rebuild preserves the manual row across removal and restore", async () => {
+    expect(
+      buildProviderCatalog(credentialed, resolved).find((c) => c.name === "fp")
+        ?.apiKey,
+    ).toBe("fp-key");
+
+    const converged = await refreshLiveProviderCatalog(
+      credentialRemoved,
+      resolved,
+    );
+    const row = converged.find((c) => c.name === "fp");
+    expect(row?.models).toEqual(["fp-large"]);
+    expect(row?.baseURL).toBe("https://fp/v1");
+    expect(row?.apiKey).toBeUndefined();
+
+    const restored = await refreshLiveProviderCatalog(credentialed, resolved);
+    expect(restored.find((c) => c.name === "fp")?.apiKey).toBe("fp-key");
+  });
+
+  test("persisting the converged catalog keeps the manual row", async () => {
+    const converged = await refreshLiveProviderCatalog(
+      credentialRemoved,
+      resolved,
+    );
+    const persisted = providerCatalogToSettings(
+      converged,
+      undefined,
+      credentialRemoved,
+    );
+    expect(persisted.providers.fp?.models).toEqual(["fp-large"]);
+    expect(persisted.providers.fp?.baseURL).toBe("https://fp/v1");
+  });
+});
+
 describe("mergeProviderIntoSettings", () => {
   test("preserves plugins and non-provider fields when upserting a provider", () => {
     const existing: Settings = {
diff --git a/src/config/index.ts b/src/config/index.ts
index b2485ed1b..4ae9a2e66 100644
--- a/src/config/index.ts
+++ b/src/config/index.ts
@@ -1139,6 +1139,21 @@ export async function loadConfig(
 // provider connect (mid-session, no restart) can rebuild the picker's
 // catalog after writing new credentials, instead of only taking effect on
 // the next process start.
+//
+// Credential-removal convergence (CL-5446) is rebuild-only: every rebuild
+// derives rows from the current settings file plus the live Codex/xAI
+// stores, so a provider without a credential is rebuilt without one and
+// re-auth restores it on the next rebuild. Settings-file rows are
+// re-projected verbatim and never deleted — with one exception: the legacy
+// bare `codex`/`xai` row dedupe (CL-5606), which drops the bare settings row
+// once that family has a live credential-backed profile. Otherwise the
+// disable-not-delete rationale holds: nothing the operator wrote is lost, and
+// nothing stale survives past the next rebuild. A dedicated disabled flag
+// was rejected: no such state exists on the catalog entry, the picker
+// option, or the host boundary, and no removal event drives a refresh
+// (there is no logout/disconnect surface or auth-store watcher; refresh
+// runs on connect, prefetch, and startup), so removal takes effect on the
+// next rebuild, not live.
 export function mergeOAuthCatalog(
   settings: Settings | null,
   resolved: ResolvedProvider,