diff --git a/roles/sys-dns-cloudflare-records/defaults/main.yml b/roles/sys-dns-cloudflare-records/defaults/main.yml
index 4226f6f8ec..c0d187c1f2 100644
--- a/roles/sys-dns-cloudflare-records/defaults/main.yml
+++ b/roles/sys-dns-cloudflare-records/defaults/main.yml
@@ -7,7 +7,8 @@ cloudflare_request_timeout: 20 # Seconds one Cloudflare HTTP socket operation ma
 cloudflare_attempt_timeout: 60 # Seconds one record job may run before async_wrapper kills it as hung
 cloudflare_attempts: 3 # Attempts per record; only hangs, timeouts, connection errors, 429 and 5xx earn another
 cloudflare_retry_delay: 10 # Seconds between two attempts
-cloudflare_collect_retries: "{{ ((lookup('timeout', cloudflare_attempt_timeout | int) | int) / 5) | round(0, 'ceil') | int + 2 }}" # Cap on 5 s polls per job; the attempt's collect deadline ends them sooner
+cloudflare_collect_interval: 1 # Seconds between two polls of one record job while collecting
+cloudflare_collect_retries: "{{ ((lookup('timeout', cloudflare_attempt_timeout | int) | int) / (cloudflare_collect_interval | int)) | round(0, 'ceil') | int + 2 }}" # Cap on polls per job; the attempt's collect deadline ends them sooner
 cloudflare_tolerate: # Substrings of an answer that mean the record already stands as wanted
   - "An identical record already exists"
   - "code: 81058"
diff --git a/roles/sys-dns-cloudflare-records/tasks/judge.yml b/roles/sys-dns-cloudflare-records/tasks/judge.yml
index b996b516a8..4602094153 100644
--- a/roles/sys-dns-cloudflare-records/tasks/judge.yml
+++ b/roles/sys-dns-cloudflare-records/tasks/judge.yml
@@ -8,7 +8,7 @@
   register: _cf_reaped
   until: _cf_reaped.finished or (now(utc=true).timestamp() > (_cf_collect_deadline | float))
   retries: "{{ cloudflare_collect_retries | int }}"
-  delay: 5
+  delay: "{{ cloudflare_collect_interval | int }}"
   changed_when: false
   ignore_errors: true
   when: ASYNC_ENABLED | bool
diff --git a/tests/unit/python/roles/sys-dns-cloudflare-records/__init__.py b/tests/unit/python/roles/sys-dns-cloudflare-records/__init__.py
new file mode 100644
index 0000000000..e69de29bb2
diff --git a/tests/unit/python/roles/sys-dns-cloudflare-records/test_collect_polling.py b/tests/unit/python/roles/sys-dns-cloudflare-records/test_collect_polling.py
new file mode 100644
index 0000000000..dc59c12755
--- /dev/null
+++ b/tests/unit/python/roles/sys-dns-cloudflare-records/test_collect_polling.py
@@ -0,0 +1,76 @@
+import unittest
+
+from jinja2 import Environment, StrictUndefined
+
+from plugins.lookup.timeout import scaled_timeout
+from utils import PROJECT_ROOT
+from utils.cache.yaml import load_yaml, load_yaml_any
+from utils.roles.mapping import ROLE_FILE_DEFAULTS_MAIN
+
+ROLE = PROJECT_ROOT / "roles" / "sys-dns-cloudflare-records"
+
+
+def _defaults() -> dict:
+    return load_yaml(str(ROLE / ROLE_FILE_DEFAULTS_MAIN))
+
+
+def _collect_task() -> dict:
+    return next(
+        task
+        for task in load_yaml_any(str(ROLE / "tasks" / "judge.yml"))
+        if "ansible.builtin.async_status" in task
+    )
+
+
+def _render(expression: str, variables: dict, factor: int):
+    """
+    Args:
+        expression: one templated value of the role.
+        variables: the role defaults the expression may read.
+        factor: the ``TIMEOUT_FACTOR`` the ``timeout`` lookup scales by.
+
+    Returns:
+        The rendered value as an integer.
+    """
+    environment = Environment(undefined=StrictUndefined, autoescape=True)
+    environment.globals["lookup"] = lambda name, base: scaled_timeout(base, factor)
+    return int(environment.from_string(str(expression)).render(**variables))
+
+
+class TestCollectPolling(unittest.TestCase):
+    def test_collect_polls_at_the_role_interval_and_retries_by_it(self):
+        defaults = _defaults()
+        task = _collect_task()
+
+        self.assertEqual(task["delay"], "{{ cloudflare_collect_interval | int }}")
+        self.assertEqual(task["retries"], "{{ cloudflare_collect_retries | int }}")
+        self.assertIn(
+            "cloudflare_collect_interval", defaults["cloudflare_collect_retries"]
+        )
+        self.assertIn("_cf_collect_deadline", task["until"])
+
+    def test_the_polling_window_covers_the_attempt_timeout(self):
+        defaults = _defaults()
+        task = _collect_task()
+        for factor in (1, 2, 3):
+            for interval in (1, 2, 5, 7):
+                with self.subTest(factor=factor, interval=interval):
+                    variables = dict(defaults, cloudflare_collect_interval=interval)
+                    variables["cloudflare_collect_retries"] = _render(
+                        defaults["cloudflare_collect_retries"], variables, factor
+                    )
+                    retries = _render(task["retries"], variables, factor)
+                    delay = _render(task["delay"], variables, factor)
+                    attempt = scaled_timeout(
+                        defaults["cloudflare_attempt_timeout"], factor
+                    )
+
+                    self.assertEqual(delay, interval)
+                    self.assertGreaterEqual(retries * delay, attempt)
+
+    def test_the_default_interval_is_one_second(self):
+        self.assertEqual(_defaults()["cloudflare_collect_interval"], 1)
+
+
+if __name__ == "__main__":
+    unittest.main()