diff --git a/frontend/src/components/Playlists.dom.test.tsx b/frontend/src/components/Playlists.dom.test.tsx
index db537359..e835fc1a 100644
--- a/frontend/src/components/Playlists.dom.test.tsx
+++ b/frontend/src/components/Playlists.dom.test.tsx
@@ -124,8 +124,15 @@ describe("Playlists — the row the player is launched with", () => {
     await waitFor(() => expect(h.player?.video.position_seconds).toBe(748));
     act(() => h.player!.onClose());
     h.player = null;
-    // What the player's cleanup does with the position the server confirmed.
-    act(() => patchCachedProgress(qc, new Map([["V", 830]])));
+    // What the player's cleanup does with the position the server confirmed. react-query hands a
+    // cache write to its observers on a setTimeout(0); outside act, the re-render it triggers is
+    // scheduled by React on its own and raced the click below under the gate's parallel load (the
+    // reopen read 748). The write is SYNCHRONOUS, so its notify timer is registered before ours and
+    // fires first — and inside act, the render it causes is flushed before act returns.
+    await act(async () => {
+      patchCachedProgress(qc, new Map([["V", 830]]));
+      await new Promise((r) => setTimeout(r, 0));
+    });
     await play("Video V");
     await waitFor(() => expect(h.player?.video.position_seconds).toBe(830));
   });