Cause:
Starting with CWA 2603, certificate validation was optimized to validate certificates on the client before initiating the TLS handshake, significantly reducing session launch time. As part of this optimization, the certificate chain structure is evaluated, including dependencies between intermediate certificates. If a circular dependency exists in the local certificate store — where Certificate A references Certificate B and Certificate B references Certificate A — the validation cannot complete and the session launch stalls.
This issue is caused by a misconfigured certificate chain on the endpoint, not by CWA.
Note: Circular intermediate certificate dependencies are outside the defined behavior of the X.509 PKI standard. RFC 5280 defines certificate chains as a strictly hierarchical, ordered sequence from leaf through intermediates to a root CA. The path validation algorithm (Section 6.1) assumes a finite, acyclic chain, and mechanisms such as pathLenConstraint enforce bounded path lengths. Circular dependencies are not accommodated by the specification.
The Circular certificate dependencies in the endpoint's certificate store need to be fixed to resolve the issue. The specific remediation will depend on the environment. However, here are the actions to follow and fix the certificates with Circular dependencies:
To identify the circular dependency on an end-point, follow the steps below:

To verify the certificate chain of the certificates with Circular dependenices, use the below command line:
Review the output for any loops or repeated issuers in the chain. Once the circular dependency is resolved, VDI sessions will launch normally.
Workaround:
If certificate remediation cannot be performed immediately, use Workspace for Web (HTML5) to launch sessions, as it does not perform client-side pre-handshake certificate validation.
Applicable Products: Citrix Workspace App for Windows 2603 and later
After upgrading to Citrix Workspace App (CWA) 2603 or later, users may experience the following on endpoints with misconfigured certificates:
A toast notification displaying "Opening <resource name>" appears and persists for approximately 5 minutes before dismissing, but the session never launches
The same users can successfully launch sessions via HTML5 (Workspace for Web)
RFC 5280 — Internet X.509 PKI Certificate and CRL Profile: https://datatracker.ietf.org/doc/html/rfc5280
CWA 2603's optimized certificate validation is more thorough in evaluating certificate chain integrity. Correcting the certificate chain resolves the issue and ensures compliance with the X.509 PKI standard.