diff --git a/gitnexus/test/helpers/test-db.ts b/gitnexus/test/helpers/test-db.ts
index 37032ebc8..5be063a2c 100644
--- a/gitnexus/test/helpers/test-db.ts
+++ b/gitnexus/test/helpers/test-db.ts
@@ -4,7 +4,8 @@
  * Creates temporary directories for tests and provides cleanup that tolerates
  * LadybugDB's known Windows handle-release lag after retries.
  */
-import fs from 'fs/promises';
+import fs from 'fs';
+import fsp from 'fs/promises';
 import os from 'os';
 import path from 'path';
 
@@ -13,22 +14,56 @@ export interface TestDBHandle {
   cleanup: () => Promise<void>;
 }
 
+const CLEANUP_MAX_ATTEMPTS = 5;
 const WINDOWS_NATIVE_LOCK_CODES = new Set(['EBUSY', 'EPERM', 'EACCES', 'ENOTEMPTY']);
 
-export async function cleanupTempDir(tmpDir: string): Promise<void> {
+const cleanupBackoffMs = (attempt: number): number => 100 * (attempt + 1);
+
+const shouldSwallowCleanupError = (err: unknown): boolean => {
+  const code = (err as NodeJS.ErrnoException | undefined)?.code;
+  return process.platform === 'win32' && WINDOWS_NATIVE_LOCK_CODES.has(code ?? '');
+};
+
+const sleepSync = (ms: number): void => {
+  const view = new Int32Array(new SharedArrayBuffer(4));
+  Atomics.wait(view, 0, 0, ms);
+};
+
+export function cleanupTempDirSync(tmpDir: string): void {
   let lastError: unknown;
-  for (let attempt = 0; attempt < 5; attempt++) {
+  for (let attempt = 0; attempt < CLEANUP_MAX_ATTEMPTS; attempt++) {
     try {
-      await fs.rm(tmpDir, { recursive: true, force: true });
+      fs.rmSync(tmpDir, { recursive: true, force: true });
       return;
     } catch (err) {
       lastError = err;
-      await new Promise((resolve) => setTimeout(resolve, 100 * (attempt + 1)));
+      if (attempt < CLEANUP_MAX_ATTEMPTS - 1) {
+        sleepSync(cleanupBackoffMs(attempt));
+      }
     }
   }
 
-  const code = (lastError as NodeJS.ErrnoException | undefined)?.code;
-  if (process.platform === 'win32' && WINDOWS_NATIVE_LOCK_CODES.has(code ?? '')) {
+  if (shouldSwallowCleanupError(lastError)) {
+    return;
+  }
+  throw lastError;
+}
+
+export async function cleanupTempDir(tmpDir: string): Promise<void> {
+  let lastError: unknown;
+  for (let attempt = 0; attempt < CLEANUP_MAX_ATTEMPTS; attempt++) {
+    try {
+      await fsp.rm(tmpDir, { recursive: true, force: true });
+      return;
+    } catch (err) {
+      lastError = err;
+      if (attempt < CLEANUP_MAX_ATTEMPTS - 1) {
+        await new Promise((resolve) => setTimeout(resolve, cleanupBackoffMs(attempt)));
+      }
+    }
+  }
+
+  if (shouldSwallowCleanupError(lastError)) {
     return;
   }
   throw lastError;
@@ -46,7 +81,7 @@ export async function cleanupTempDir(tmpDir: string): Promise<void> {
  * return.
  */
 export async function createTempDir(prefix: string = 'gitnexus-test-'): Promise<TestDBHandle> {
-  const tmpDir = await fs.mkdtemp(path.join(os.tmpdir(), prefix));
+  const tmpDir = await fsp.mkdtemp(path.join(os.tmpdir(), prefix));
   return {
     dbPath: tmpDir,
     cleanup: async () => {
diff --git a/gitnexus/test/integration/cli-e2e.test.ts b/gitnexus/test/integration/cli-e2e.test.ts
index b739ad070..194b3813b 100644
--- a/gitnexus/test/integration/cli-e2e.test.ts
+++ b/gitnexus/test/integration/cli-e2e.test.ts
@@ -16,6 +16,7 @@ import os from 'os';
 import { fileURLToPath, pathToFileURL } from 'url';
 
 import { createRequire } from 'module';
+import { cleanupTempDirSync } from '../helpers/test-db.js';
 
 const testDir = path.dirname(fileURLToPath(import.meta.url));
 const repoRoot = path.resolve(testDir, '../..');
@@ -75,10 +76,10 @@ afterAll(() => {
   // Entire tmp copy goes away — no selective cleanup needed. The shared
   // `test/fixtures/mini-repo/` source was never touched.
   if (tmpParent) {
-    fs.rmSync(tmpParent, { recursive: true, force: true });
+    cleanupTempDirSync(tmpParent);
   }
   if (suiteGitnexusHome) {
-    fs.rmSync(suiteGitnexusHome, { recursive: true, force: true });
+    cleanupTempDirSync(suiteGitnexusHome);
   }
 });
 
@@ -268,8 +269,8 @@ describe('CLI end-to-end', () => {
         `registry has no entry for ${repo}; entries: ${JSON.stringify(entries.map((e) => e.path))}`,
       ).toBe(true);
     } finally {
-      fs.rmSync(gnHome, { recursive: true, force: true });
-      fs.rmSync(repoParent, { recursive: true, force: true });
+      cleanupTempDirSync(gnHome);
+      cleanupTempDirSync(repoParent);
     }
   }, 60_000);
 
@@ -310,8 +311,8 @@ describe('CLI end-to-end', () => {
       expect(`${second.stdout}${second.stderr}`).toMatch(/registry entry/i);
       expect(second.status).toBe(1);
     } finally {
-      fs.rmSync(gnHome, { recursive: true, force: true });
-      fs.rmSync(repoParent, { recursive: true, force: true });
+      cleanupTempDirSync(gnHome);
+      cleanupTempDirSync(repoParent);
     }
   }, 60_000);
 
@@ -457,12 +458,12 @@ describe('CLI end-to-end', () => {
           const afterStep4 = JSON.parse(fs.readFileSync(registryPath, 'utf-8'));
           expect(afterStep4).toHaveLength(2);
         } finally {
-          fs.rmSync(parentC, { recursive: true, force: true });
+          cleanupTempDirSync(parentC);
         }
       } finally {
-        fs.rmSync(gnHome, { recursive: true, force: true });
-        fs.rmSync(parentA, { recursive: true, force: true });
-        fs.rmSync(parentB, { recursive: true, force: true });
+        cleanupTempDirSync(gnHome);
+        cleanupTempDirSync(parentA);
+        cleanupTempDirSync(parentB);
       }
     }, 360000); // 6-min outer budget (4 × ~60s analyze calls + fixture setup)
   });
@@ -571,8 +572,8 @@ describe('CLI end-to-end', () => {
         expect(r4.status).toBe(0);
         expect(`${r4.stdout}${r4.stderr}`).toMatch(/Nothing to remove/i);
       } finally {
-        fs.rmSync(gnHome, { recursive: true, force: true });
-        fs.rmSync(parentA, { recursive: true, force: true });
+        cleanupTempDirSync(gnHome);
+        cleanupTempDirSync(parentA);
       }
     }, 180000); // 3-min outer budget (1 × ~60s analyze + 3 × fast remove calls)
 
@@ -675,9 +676,9 @@ describe('CLI end-to-end', () => {
         // And it's NOT the one we just removed.
         expect(finalEntries[0].path).not.toBe(repoAEntry.path);
       } finally {
-        fs.rmSync(gnHome, { recursive: true, force: true });
-        fs.rmSync(parentA, { recursive: true, force: true });
-        fs.rmSync(parentB, { recursive: true, force: true });
+        cleanupTempDirSync(gnHome);
+        cleanupTempDirSync(parentA);
+        cleanupTempDirSync(parentB);
       }
     }, 240000); // 4-min outer budget (2 × ~60s analyze + 2 × fast remove)
 
@@ -759,8 +760,8 @@ describe('CLI end-to-end', () => {
         expect(afterRegistry).toHaveLength(1);
         expect(afterRegistry[0].storagePath).toBe(repo); // still poisoned (we did that)
       } finally {
-        fs.rmSync(gnHome, { recursive: true, force: true });
-        fs.rmSync(parent, { recursive: true, force: true });
+        cleanupTempDirSync(gnHome);
+        cleanupTempDirSync(parent);
       }
     }, 120000); // 2-min budget (1 × ~60s analyze + 1 × fast remove-refused)
   });
@@ -864,9 +865,9 @@ describe('CLI end-to-end', () => {
         expect(afterRegistry).toHaveLength(1);
         expect(afterRegistry[0].name).toBe('bad-alias');
       } finally {
-        fs.rmSync(gnHome, { recursive: true, force: true });
-        fs.rmSync(parentBad, { recursive: true, force: true });
-        fs.rmSync(parentGood, { recursive: true, force: true });
+        cleanupTempDirSync(gnHome);
+        cleanupTempDirSync(parentBad);
+        cleanupTempDirSync(parentGood);
       }
     }, 240000); // 4-min budget (2 × ~60s analyze + 1 × fast clean --all)
   });
@@ -954,7 +955,7 @@ describe('CLI end-to-end', () => {
         expect(result.status).toBe(0);
         expect(result.stdout).toMatch(/Repository not indexed/);
       } finally {
-        fs.rmSync(tmpDir, { recursive: true, force: true });
+        cleanupTempDirSync(tmpDir);
       }
     });
 
@@ -968,7 +969,7 @@ describe('CLI end-to-end', () => {
         expect(result.status).toBe(0);
         expect(result.stdout).toMatch(/Not a git repository/);
       } finally {
-        fs.rmSync(tmpDir, { recursive: true, force: true });
+        cleanupTempDirSync(tmpDir);
       }
     });
 
@@ -984,7 +985,7 @@ describe('CLI end-to-end', () => {
         expect(result.status).toBe(1);
         expect(result.stdout).toMatch(/not.*git repository/i);
       } finally {
-        fs.rmSync(tmpDir, { recursive: true, force: true });
+        cleanupTempDirSync(tmpDir);
       }
     });
   });
@@ -1014,7 +1015,7 @@ describe('CLI end-to-end', () => {
         expect(result.status).toBe(1);
         expect(result.stdout).toMatch(/not.*git repository/i);
       } finally {
-        fs.rmSync(tmpDir, { recursive: true, force: true });
+        cleanupTempDirSync(tmpDir);
       }
     });
 
@@ -1051,7 +1052,7 @@ describe('CLI end-to-end', () => {
         expect(result.status).toBe(1);
         expect(result.stdout).toMatch(/No GitNexus index found/);
       } finally {
-        fs.rmSync(tmpDir, { recursive: true, force: true });
+        cleanupTempDirSync(tmpDir);
       }
     });