diff --git a/backend/__tests__/routes/slideshowAdmin.test.js b/backend/__tests__/routes/slideshowAdmin.test.js
index 45c08fbe..ca277004 100644
--- a/backend/__tests__/routes/slideshowAdmin.test.js
+++ b/backend/__tests__/routes/slideshowAdmin.test.js
@@ -57,6 +57,9 @@ async function insertEvent(db, adminId, over = {}) {
 describe('admin Live Slideshow endpoints', () => {
   let db; let cleanup; let app; let adminId; let token;
 
+  // Match slideshowPublic.test.js — bootCrmDb's full migration run intermittently
+  // exceeds Jest's default 5s `beforeAll` timeout on slower CI runners; raise
+  // it so this doesn't block PRs.
   beforeAll(async () => {
     ({ db, cleanup } = await bootCrmDb());
     ({ adminId } = await seedMinimal(db));
@@ -72,7 +75,7 @@ describe('admin Live Slideshow endpoints', () => {
     app.use((err, req, res, next) => {
       res.status(err.statusCode || err.status || 500).json({ error: err.message, code: err.code });
     });
-  });
+  }, 30000);
 
   afterAll(async () => { await cleanup(); });
 
diff --git a/backend/__tests__/routes/slideshowPublic.test.js b/backend/__tests__/routes/slideshowPublic.test.js
index 64e1d185..5bb6633a 100644
--- a/backend/__tests__/routes/slideshowPublic.test.js
+++ b/backend/__tests__/routes/slideshowPublic.test.js
@@ -67,6 +67,11 @@ async function insertEvent(db, over = {}) {
 describe('public Live Slideshow routes', () => {
   let db; let cleanup; let app;
 
+  // bootCrmDb runs the full migration set against a fresh SQLite file, which
+  // takes <2s locally but has been observed to exceed Jest's default 5s
+  // `beforeAll` timeout on slower GitHub Actions runners (~5.4s — runner-to-
+  // runner I/O variance). Raise the hook timeout so this doesn't intermittently
+  // block PRs on CI; doesn't affect happy-path local runs.
   beforeAll(async () => {
     ({ db, cleanup } = await bootCrmDb());
     await seedMinimal(db);
@@ -81,7 +86,7 @@ describe('public Live Slideshow routes', () => {
     app.use((err, req, res, next) => {
       res.status(err.statusCode || err.status || 500).json({ error: err.message, code: err.code });
     });
-  });
+  }, 30000);
 
   afterAll(async () => { await cleanup(); });