diff --git a/test/test_helpers/prefs.dart b/test/test_helpers/prefs.dart
index b53b9c95..be8c5a25 100644
--- a/test/test_helpers/prefs.dart
+++ b/test/test_helpers/prefs.dart
@@ -1,5 +1,6 @@
 import 'package:flutter_test/flutter_test.dart';
 import 'package:plezy/services/base_shared_preferences_service.dart';
+import 'package:plezy/services/prefs_recovery.dart';
 import 'package:plezy/services/settings_service.dart';
 import 'package:shared_preferences/shared_preferences.dart';
 import 'package:shared_preferences_platform_interface/in_memory_shared_preferences_async.dart';
@@ -17,8 +18,18 @@ void resetSharedPreferencesForTest({Map<String, Object> initialAsync = const {}}
     SharedPreferences.resetStatic();
     SettingsService.resetForTesting();
     BaseSharedPreferencesService.resetForTesting();
+    PrefsRecovery.debugSetSupportedPlatformOverride(null);
   });
   TestWidgetsFlutterBinding.ensureInitialized();
+  // The desktop store preflight (`PrefsRecovery.assertStoreReadable`) reads
+  // the real on-disk store through path_provider. These fixtures replace the
+  // preference backends with in-memory fakes, so there is no real store to
+  // validate — and on the hosts where the preflight is active (Linux and
+  // Windows) its genuine file IO can never complete inside `testWidgets`'
+  // fake async zone, deadlocking every widget test that initialises settings
+  // until the ten-minute timeout. Suites that exercise the preflight itself
+  // (`prefs_store_repair_flow_test.dart`) opt back in explicitly.
+  PrefsRecovery.debugSetSupportedPlatformOverride(false);
   SharedPreferences.setMockInitialValues({});
   SharedPreferencesAsyncPlatform.instance = initialAsync.isEmpty
       ? InMemorySharedPreferencesAsync.empty()