diff --git a/packages/cli/src/capture/captureCompositionFrame.test.ts b/packages/cli/src/capture/captureCompositionFrame.test.ts
index 46840097a4..a1cfff9823 100644
--- a/packages/cli/src/capture/captureCompositionFrame.test.ts
+++ b/packages/cli/src/capture/captureCompositionFrame.test.ts
@@ -3,6 +3,8 @@ import { tmpdir } from "node:os";
 import { join } from "node:path";
 import { afterEach, describe, expect, it, vi } from "vitest";
 import {
+  AUDIT_SEEK_OPTIONS,
+  DENSE_GEOMETRY_SEEK_OPTIONS,
   captureRegionCrop,
   clampCropRegion,
   installPageFunctionGuard,
@@ -374,3 +376,15 @@ describe("installPageFunctionGuard", () => {
     expect(shim(marker)).toBe(marker);
   });
 });
+
+describe("DENSE_GEOMETRY_SEEK_OPTIONS", () => {
+  it("is genuinely geometry-only — no post-seek settle waits at the 600-sample cap", () => {
+    // Dense pass must not inherit AUDIT's post-seek waits — geometry is valid synchronously after setTime, and waits multiply by sample count.
+    expect(DENSE_GEOMETRY_SEEK_OPTIONS.animationFrameSettle).toBe("none");
+    expect(DENSE_GEOMETRY_SEEK_OPTIONS.waitForFontsMs).toBe(0);
+    expect(DENSE_GEOMETRY_SEEK_OPTIONS.settleMs).toBe(0);
+    // AUDIT (the full-settle path used by the base grid) must still carry the waits.
+    expect(AUDIT_SEEK_OPTIONS.animationFrameSettle).toBe("double");
+    expect(AUDIT_SEEK_OPTIONS.settleMs).toBeGreaterThan(0);
+  });
+});
diff --git a/packages/cli/src/capture/captureCompositionFrame.ts b/packages/cli/src/capture/captureCompositionFrame.ts
index fff9bf4b2e..167ebd892e 100644
--- a/packages/cli/src/capture/captureCompositionFrame.ts
+++ b/packages/cli/src/capture/captureCompositionFrame.ts
@@ -18,6 +18,14 @@ export const AUDIT_SEEK_OPTIONS = {
   settleMs: 120,
 } as const;
 
+// Geometry-only seek for the dense content_overlap grid: getBoundingClientRect is valid synchronously after setTime, so drop all post-seek waits (rAF/font/sleep) that would multiply across the dense grid.
+export const DENSE_GEOMETRY_SEEK_OPTIONS = {
+  ...AUDIT_SEEK_OPTIONS,
+  animationFrameSettle: "none",
+  waitForFontsMs: 0,
+  settleMs: 0,
+} as const;
+
 export interface SeekCompositionTimelineOptions {
   fallbackToBridgeAndTimelines?: boolean;
   waitForPreferredSeekTargetMs?: number;
diff --git a/packages/cli/src/commands/check.test.ts b/packages/cli/src/commands/check.test.ts
index cdac2483ae..8d9a07f97e 100644
--- a/packages/cli/src/commands/check.test.ts
+++ b/packages/cli/src/commands/check.test.ts
@@ -147,7 +147,9 @@ function fakeDriver(overrides: Partial<CheckAuditDriver> = {}): CheckAuditDriver
     getCanvas: vi.fn(async () => ({ width: 1920, height: 1080 })),
     findAmbiguousSelectors: vi.fn(async (_selectors: string[]) => []),
     seek: vi.fn(async (_time: number) => undefined),
+    seekGeometry: vi.fn(async (_time: number) => undefined),
     collectLayout: vi.fn(async (_time: number, _tolerance: number) => []),
+    collectOverlap: vi.fn(async (_time: number) => []),
     collectLayoutGeometry: vi.fn(async () => `geometry-${geometryCallCount++}`),
     collectRotationSample: vi.fn(async (_time: number) => []),
     collectOffPivotRotationSample: vi.fn(async (time: number) => ({ time, samples: [] })),
@@ -1343,3 +1345,42 @@ describe("contrast candidate round-trip", () => {
     expect(source).not.toMatch(/prepared\.map\(\(entry\) => entry\.candidate\)/);
   });
 });
+
+describe("dense motion-overlap re-sampling", () => {
+  // Collision lives inside (3.5, 4.5), a gap the sparse base grid seeks past; only the 8fps dense pass observes it.
+  const inBetweenGridWindow = (time: number): boolean => time >= 3.6 && time <= 4.4;
+
+  it("detects a content_overlap that occurs ONLY between two sparse grid samples", async () => {
+    const driver = fakeDriver({
+      // Sparse base grid sees nothing at any base sample time.
+      collectLayout: vi.fn(async (_time: number) => []),
+      // The transient exists only strictly between base samples 3.5 and 4.5.
+      collectOverlap: vi.fn(async (time: number) =>
+        inBetweenGridWindow(time)
+          ? [layoutIssue("warning", { time, code: "content_overlap" })]
+          : [],
+      ),
+    });
+    const { report } = await runScenario(driver);
+    expect(driver.collectOverlap).toHaveBeenCalled();
+    expect(report.layout.findings.some((f) => f.code === "content_overlap")).toBe(true);
+    // Held ~750ms across the dense grid (>= the 500ms floor) -> promoted.
+    expect(report.layout.errorCount).toBeGreaterThan(0);
+  });
+
+  it("runs the dense pass even when sparse fingerprints are identical (aliased motion)", async () => {
+    // Aliased motion has identical fingerprints yet still collides between samples — the false-negative the removed gate caused.
+    const driver = fakeDriver({
+      collectLayoutGeometry: vi.fn(async () => "static"),
+      collectLayout: vi.fn(async (_time: number) => []),
+      collectOverlap: vi.fn(async (time: number) =>
+        inBetweenGridWindow(time)
+          ? [layoutIssue("warning", { time, code: "content_overlap" })]
+          : [],
+      ),
+    });
+    const { report } = await runScenario(driver);
+    expect(driver.collectOverlap).toHaveBeenCalled();
+    expect(report.layout.findings.some((f) => f.code === "content_overlap")).toBe(true);
+  });
+});
diff --git a/packages/cli/src/commands/layout-audit.browser.js b/packages/cli/src/commands/layout-audit.browser.js
index 1ee9085dd4..382184309a 100644
--- a/packages/cli/src/commands/layout-audit.browser.js
+++ b/packages/cli/src/commands/layout-audit.browser.js
@@ -1425,6 +1425,16 @@
     return issues;
   };
 
+  // Reruns only the overlap detector (same threshold, no new surface) on a fine grid for the dense motion re-sampling pass.
+  window.__hyperframesOverlapAudit = function auditOverlap(options) {
+    const time = options && typeof options.time === "number" ? options.time : 0;
+    const root =
+      document.querySelector("[data-composition-id][data-width][data-height]") ||
+      document.querySelector("[data-composition-id]") ||
+      document.body;
+    return contentOverlapIssues(root, time);
+  };
+
   // Frozen-sweep guard (#U10, checkPipeline.ts): a compact per-sample
   // fingerprint of every visible element's box + opacity, in DOM order. Node
   // calls this once per seeked grid point and compares the strings across the
diff --git a/packages/cli/src/utils/checkBrowser.ts b/packages/cli/src/utils/checkBrowser.ts
index d392e82677..c47cced9ca 100644
--- a/packages/cli/src/utils/checkBrowser.ts
+++ b/packages/cli/src/utils/checkBrowser.ts
@@ -3,6 +3,7 @@ import { join, resolve } from "node:path";
 import type { Page } from "puppeteer-core";
 import {
   AUDIT_SEEK_OPTIONS,
+  DENSE_GEOMETRY_SEEK_OPTIONS,
   DEFAULT_ZOOM_PADDING_PX,
   DEFAULT_ZOOM_SCALE,
   captureRegionCrop,
@@ -348,7 +349,12 @@ function createPageDriver(page: Page, setTime: (time: number) => void): CheckAud
       setTime(time);
       await seekCompositionTimeline(page, time, AUDIT_SEEK_OPTIONS);
     },
+    seekGeometry: async (time) => {
+      setTime(time);
+      await seekCompositionTimeline(page, time, DENSE_GEOMETRY_SEEK_OPTIONS);
+    },
     collectLayout: (time, tolerance) => collectLayout(page, time, tolerance),
+    collectOverlap: (time) => collectOverlap(page, time),
     collectLayoutGeometry: () => collectLayoutGeometry(page),
     collectRotationSample: (time) => collectRotationSample(page, time),
     collectOffPivotRotationSample: (time) => collectOffPivotRotationSample(page, time),
@@ -464,6 +470,19 @@ async function collectLayout(
   return anchorLayoutIssues(page, raw.flatMap(parseLayoutIssue));
 }
 
+async function collectOverlap(page: Page, time: number): Promise<AnchoredLayoutIssue[]> {
+  const raw = await page.evaluate(
+    (options: { time: number }) => {
+      const audit = Reflect.get(window, "__hyperframesOverlapAudit");
+      if (typeof audit !== "function") return [];
+      const result = Reflect.apply(audit, window, [options]);
+      return Array.isArray(result) ? result : [];
+    },
+    { time },
+  );
+  return anchorLayoutIssues(page, raw.flatMap(parseLayoutIssue));
+}
+
 async function collectLayoutGeometry(page: Page): Promise<string> {
   return page.evaluate(() => {
     const geometry = Reflect.get(window, "__hyperframesLayoutGeometry");
diff --git a/packages/cli/src/utils/checkPipeline.ts b/packages/cli/src/utils/checkPipeline.ts
index 6f5145c8ff..a02fb2fa5b 100644
--- a/packages/cli/src/utils/checkPipeline.ts
+++ b/packages/cli/src/utils/checkPipeline.ts
@@ -417,9 +417,42 @@ async function collectGridSamples(
       collected.screenshots.push({ time, pngBase64: capture.pngBase64 });
     }
   }
+  await collectMotionOverlapSamples(driver, grid, collected);
   return collected;
 }
 
+// Dense grid catches mid-motion text collisions the sparse layout grid seeks past; text-only overlap collection is cheap enough to afford it.
+const OVERLAP_SAMPLE_FPS = 8;
+// Ceiling that bounds dense seeks; past ~75s the grid degrades below 8fps rather than growing the seek budget without limit.
+const OVERLAP_MAX_SAMPLES = 600;
+
+function buildOverlapSampleTimes(duration: number): number[] {
+  if (!Number.isFinite(duration) || duration <= 0) return [];
+  const count = Math.min(
+    OVERLAP_MAX_SAMPLES,
+    Math.max(2, Math.ceil(duration * OVERLAP_SAMPLE_FPS) + 1),
+  );
+  const step = duration / (count - 1);
+  return mergeSampleTimes(
+    Array.from({ length: count }, (_, index) => Math.round(index * step * 1000) / 1000),
+  );
+}
+
+/** Reruns content_overlap on a fine grid, unconditionally rather than gated on fingerprint change, since an animation aliased to the sparse grid collides between identical-fingerprint samples. */
+async function collectMotionOverlapSamples(
+  driver: CheckAuditDriver,
+  grid: SampleGrid,
+  collected: GridSamples,
+): Promise<void> {
+  const baseTimes = new Set(grid.layoutSamples);
+  for (const time of buildOverlapSampleTimes(grid.duration)) {
+    if (baseTimes.has(time)) continue;
+    // Settle-free seek: collectOverlap reads getBoundingClientRect geometry, valid synchronously after setTime, so the dense pass skips the per-seek paint settle.
+    await driver.seekGeometry(time);
+    collected.layoutIssues.push(...(await driver.collectOverlap(time)));
+  }
+}
+
 // Frozen-sweep guard (#U10): compositions this short can legitimately hold a
 // single static frame the whole time (a title card) — never flag those.
 const SWEEP_STATIC_MIN_DURATION_SEC = 3;
diff --git a/packages/cli/src/utils/checkTypes.ts b/packages/cli/src/utils/checkTypes.ts
index 569051724a..c334787e37 100644
--- a/packages/cli/src/utils/checkTypes.ts
+++ b/packages/cli/src/utils/checkTypes.ts
@@ -173,7 +173,11 @@ export interface CheckAuditDriver {
   getCanvas(): Promise<Canvas>;
   findAmbiguousSelectors(selectors: string[]): Promise<AnchoredLayoutIssue[]>;
   seek(time: number): Promise<void>;
+  /** Settle-free seek for the geometry-only dense content_overlap pass; only collectOverlap consumes it, and getBoundingClientRect is valid synchronously after setTime. */
+  seekGeometry(time: number): Promise<void>;
   collectLayout(time: number, tolerance: number): Promise<AnchoredLayoutIssue[]>;
+  /** content_overlap only, for the dense re-sampling grid — catches transient text collisions the sparse grid seeks past. */
+  collectOverlap(time: number): Promise<AnchoredLayoutIssue[]>;
   /** Frozen-sweep guard (#U10): an opaque per-sample geometry+opacity
    * fingerprint of the current seeked state, for detecting a timeline that
    * never advances under seek. See layout-audit.browser.js. */
diff --git a/packages/cli/src/utils/layoutAudit.test.ts b/packages/cli/src/utils/layoutAudit.test.ts
index bccb025ae7..13ea482e32 100644
--- a/packages/cli/src/utils/layoutAudit.test.ts
+++ b/packages/cli/src/utils/layoutAudit.test.ts
@@ -227,6 +227,47 @@ describe("persistence-tiered severity (#U10)", () => {
     expect(collapsed[0]).toMatchObject({ severity: "error", occurrences: 2 });
   });
 
+  it("keeps a content_overlap that spans under the 500ms floor as a warning, even with 2 occurrences", () => {
+    // Two dense-pass occurrences ~125ms apart are under the held-duration floor, so occurrences>=2 alone must not promote to error.
+    const collapsed = collapseStaticLayoutIssues(
+      [
+        { ...issue("content_overlap", "warning"), time: 4.0 },
+        { ...issue("content_overlap", "warning"), time: 4.125 },
+      ],
+      73,
+    );
+
+    expect(collapsed).toHaveLength(1);
+    expect(collapsed[0]).toMatchObject({ severity: "warning", occurrences: 2 });
+  });
+
+  it("does NOT promote content_overlap whose two occurrences span exactly 499ms (under the floor)", () => {
+    // Boundary: a span one millisecond short of the 500ms floor stays a warning — guards the AND-tighten for sparse callers.
+    const collapsed = collapseStaticLayoutIssues(
+      [
+        { ...issue("content_overlap", "warning"), time: 4.0 },
+        { ...issue("content_overlap", "warning"), time: 4.499 },
+      ],
+      73,
+    );
+
+    expect(collapsed).toHaveLength(1);
+    expect(collapsed[0]).toMatchObject({ severity: "warning", occurrences: 2 });
+  });
+
+  it("promotes content_overlap whose two occurrences span exactly 500ms (at the floor)", () => {
+    const collapsed = collapseStaticLayoutIssues(
+      [
+        { ...issue("content_overlap", "warning"), time: 4.0 },
+        { ...issue("content_overlap", "warning"), time: 4.5 },
+      ],
+      73,
+    );
+
+    expect(collapsed).toHaveLength(1);
+    expect(collapsed[0]).toMatchObject({ severity: "error", occurrences: 2 });
+  });
+
   it("promotes a held, canvas-scale canvas_overflow breach from info to warning", () => {
     const breach = {
       ...issue("canvas_overflow", "info"),
diff --git a/packages/cli/src/utils/layoutAudit.ts b/packages/cli/src/utils/layoutAudit.ts
index 678e1210c6..5f68cb7007 100644
--- a/packages/cli/src/utils/layoutAudit.ts
+++ b/packages/cli/src/utils/layoutAudit.ts
@@ -181,21 +181,7 @@ export function dedupeLayoutIssues(issues: LayoutIssue[]): LayoutIssue[] {
   return result;
 }
 
-// Persistence-tier thresholds (#U10, adapted from Adam Rosler's visual-linter
-// design). The approach doc frames these as held-duration floors — ignore
-// under ~250ms, re-promote content_overlap at >= ~500ms — measured against
-// the SAME firstSeen/lastSeen span this collapse step already tracks. At the
-// default 9-sample grid over a multi-second composition, a single collapsed
-// occurrence is held 0ms (one entrance/exit transient sample) and two
-// collapsed occurrences are already >= one sample-to-sample gap, which is
-// well past 500ms — so "held under 250ms" reduces to `occurrences <= 1` and
-// "held >= 500ms" reduces to `occurrences >= 2`. Tiering below is written in
-// those sample-count terms (the mapping the approach doc asks to document),
-// with the literal ms span (CONTENT_OVERLAP_HELD_ERROR_MS) kept as a fallback
-// for callers whose samples really are spaced close enough together for the
-// ms floor to matter on its own (dense `--at`/`--at-transitions` runs). The
-// ~250ms ignore floor needs no separate constant — see the occurrences <= 1
-// branch below.
+// Persistence-tier thresholds (#U10): occurrences>=2 alone can't imply the 500ms floor under dense 8fps sampling, so content_overlap promotion requires a literal firstSeen..lastSeen span >= 500ms — stricter for sparse callers too.
 const CONTENT_OVERLAP_HELD_ERROR_MS = 500;
 const HELD_ACROSS_SAMPLES_MIN_OCCURRENCES = 2;
 
@@ -317,11 +303,10 @@ function isCanvasBreachHeldLarge(issue: LayoutIssue, occurrences: number): boole
   return overlapX > 0 && overlapY > 0;
 }
 
-// Split out of applyPersistenceTier so the two independent "held long enough"
-// signals (sample count vs. wall-clock span) read as one boolean question
-// instead of adding a third compound branch to the tiering ladder above.
+// Split out of applyPersistenceTier so the compound "held long enough" test reads as one boolean question.
 function isContentOverlapHeldLongEnough(issue: LayoutIssue, occurrences: number): boolean {
-  if (occurrences >= HELD_ACROSS_SAMPLES_MIN_OCCURRENCES) return true;
+  // Two samples measure a span, but under dense 8fps sampling that span must still clear the wall-clock floor.
+  if (occurrences < HELD_ACROSS_SAMPLES_MIN_OCCURRENCES) return false;
   const firstSeen = issue.firstSeen ?? issue.time;
   const lastSeen = issue.lastSeen ?? issue.time;
   const heldMs = (lastSeen - firstSeen) * 1000;