diff --git a/CHANGELOG.md b/CHANGELOG.md
index ea463b0d..799f0ca7 100644
--- a/CHANGELOG.md
+++ b/CHANGELOG.md
@@ -3,6 +3,12 @@
 
 ## [Unreleased]
 
+## [v0.51.370] — 2026-06-12 — Release MI (model picker shows real providers when /api/models rebuild times out)
+
+### Fixed
+
+- **The model picker no longer collapses to a single "Default" entry when the live model-catalog rebuild exceeds its time budget (#3928).** On the first cold open after a restart, `/api/models` rebuilds the provider catalog by probing each configured provider; on a slow network (or behind a corporate proxy) that probe can blow the bounded rebuild budget. The over-budget fallback previously served an emergency one-model catalog, so the picker showed only "Default" until a later request rebuilt successfully. It now serves a richer **network-free** catalog assembled from local config and the auth store — the active provider and its default model, configured `providers.*` entries, credential-pool providers (excluding ambient `gh` CLI tokens), known providers that have a key, declared fallback providers, and custom providers — with the active provider listed first. The 4-second guardrail is unchanged, the real catalog still refreshes out-of-band for the next caller, nothing is written to the 24-hour disk cache from this path, and the build safely degrades to the minimal one-model catalog if anything goes wrong. (#3928)
+
 ## [v0.51.369] — 2026-06-12 — Release MH (WebUI streaming honors runtime target model/base_url)
 
 ### Fixed
diff --git a/api/config.py b/api/config.py
index 8b9270c7..18e0b739 100644
--- a/api/config.py
+++ b/api/config.py
@@ -3449,17 +3449,24 @@ def _static_models_catalog_without_live_probes() -> dict:
                 if isinstance(cfg_models, dict):
                     raw_models = [{"id": key, "label": key} for key in cfg_models.keys()]
                 elif isinstance(cfg_models, list):
-                    raw_models = [
-                        {
-                            "id": item["id"] if isinstance(item, dict) else item,
-                            "label": (
-                                item.get("label", item["id"])
-                                if isinstance(item, dict)
-                                else item
-                            ),
-                        }
-                        for item in cfg_models
-                    ]
+                    raw_models = []
+                    for item in cfg_models:
+                        if isinstance(item, dict):
+                            model_id = (
+                                item.get("id")
+                                or item.get("model")
+                                or item.get("name")
+                            )
+                            if not model_id:
+                                continue
+                            raw_models.append(
+                                {
+                                    "id": model_id,
+                                    "label": item.get("label", model_id),
+                                }
+                            )
+                        elif item:
+                            raw_models.append({"id": item, "label": item})
             if not raw_models:
                 raw_models = copy.deepcopy(_PROVIDER_MODELS.get(pid, []))
             for model_id in configured_model_ids.get(pid, []):
diff --git a/tests/test_issue3928_models_budget_fallback.py b/tests/test_issue3928_models_budget_fallback.py
index b2e18d45..8d3bb789 100644
--- a/tests/test_issue3928_models_budget_fallback.py
+++ b/tests/test_issue3928_models_budget_fallback.py
@@ -217,3 +217,47 @@ def test_default_group_survives_only_as_emergency_last_resort(
     assert catalog["groups"][0]["provider"] == "Default"
     assert catalog["groups"][0]["provider_id"] == "anthropic"
     assert catalog["groups"][0]["models"][0]["id"] == "claude-sonnet-4.6"
+
+
+def test_provider_models_list_of_dicts_without_id_does_not_collapse_catalog(
+    monkeypatch,
+    isolate_models_catalog_state,
+):
+    """A legal ``providers.<id>.models`` list of dicts keyed by ``model``/``name``
+    (not ``id``) must still build the rich catalog instead of KeyError-ing into
+    the minimal one-model fallback."""
+    cfg.cfg = {
+        "model": {
+            "provider": "openai-api",
+            "default": "gpt-5.5",
+        },
+        "providers": {
+            "openai_api": {
+                "api_key": "***",
+                # list-of-dicts keyed by "model"/"name", and a bare string —
+                # all legal config shapes that the strict item["id"] path broke.
+                "models": [
+                    {"model": "gpt-5.5", "label": "GPT-5.5"},
+                    {"name": "gpt-4.1"},
+                    "gpt-4o",
+                    {"label": "no-id-no-model"},  # nothing usable → skipped, no crash
+                ],
+            },
+        },
+    }
+
+    catalog = cfg._static_models_catalog_without_live_probes()
+    provider_ids = [group["provider_id"] for group in catalog["groups"]]
+
+    # Must NOT have collapsed to the emergency single "Default" group.
+    assert not (
+        len(catalog["groups"]) == 1
+        and catalog["groups"][0]["provider"] == "Default"
+    )
+    assert "openai-api" in provider_ids
+    openai_group = next(g for g in catalog["groups"] if g["provider_id"] == "openai-api")
+    group_model_ids = {str(m.get("id") or "") for m in openai_group["models"]}
+    # All three identifiable models survive; the unusable entry is dropped.
+    assert any(mid.endswith("gpt-5.5") for mid in group_model_ids)
+    assert any(mid.endswith("gpt-4.1") for mid in group_model_ids)
+    assert any(mid.endswith("gpt-4o") for mid in group_model_ids)