diff --git a/examples/basic-app/wrnexus.config.ts b/examples/basic-app/wrnexus.config.ts
index f2cb88eb..cbb94a80 100644
--- a/examples/basic-app/wrnexus.config.ts
+++ b/examples/basic-app/wrnexus.config.ts
@@ -1,3 +1,6 @@
+import { tmpdir } from "node:os";
+import { join } from "node:path";
+
 import type { AppConfig } from "@wrnexus/styles";
 
 /**
@@ -100,7 +103,14 @@ const config: AppConfig = {
       seo: { title: "WrNexus (UAT)", robots: "noindex,nofollow" },
     },
     test: {
-      db: { driver: "sqlite", url: "file:./test.db" },
+      // A fresh database per run. A file checked into the working tree would
+      // carry a schema from an earlier run, and a migration such as
+      // 0003_add_password then re-applies against a column that already
+      // exists, failing the suite on developer machines but not on CI.
+      db: {
+        driver: "sqlite",
+        url: `file:${join(tmpdir(), `wrnexus-test-${process.pid}.db`)}`,
+      },
     },
   },
 };
diff --git a/examples/inter-app-api-showcase/apps/admin/wrnexus.config.ts b/examples/inter-app-api-showcase/apps/admin/wrnexus.config.ts
index 3508cb54..315abed6 100644
--- a/examples/inter-app-api-showcase/apps/admin/wrnexus.config.ts
+++ b/examples/inter-app-api-showcase/apps/admin/wrnexus.config.ts
@@ -1,3 +1,6 @@
+import { tmpdir } from "node:os";
+import { join } from "node:path";
+
 import type { AppConfig } from "@wrnexus/styles";
 
 const config: AppConfig = {
@@ -133,7 +136,11 @@ const config: AppConfig = {
   profiles: {
     development: {},
     test: {
-      db: { driver: "sqlite", url: "file:./test.db" },
+      // A fresh database per run; a persisted file carries an earlier schema.
+      db: {
+        driver: "sqlite",
+        url: `file:${join(tmpdir(), `wrnexus-test-${process.pid}.db`)}`,
+      },
       observability: { exporter: "none", sampleRate: 0 },
     },
     staging: {
diff --git a/examples/inter-app-api-showcase/apps/web/wrnexus.config.ts b/examples/inter-app-api-showcase/apps/web/wrnexus.config.ts
index 3172c1d1..facc82aa 100644
--- a/examples/inter-app-api-showcase/apps/web/wrnexus.config.ts
+++ b/examples/inter-app-api-showcase/apps/web/wrnexus.config.ts
@@ -1,3 +1,6 @@
+import { tmpdir } from "node:os";
+import { join } from "node:path";
+
 import type { AppConfig } from "@wrnexus/styles";
 
 const config: AppConfig = {
@@ -133,7 +136,11 @@ const config: AppConfig = {
   profiles: {
     development: {},
     test: {
-      db: { driver: "sqlite", url: "file:./test.db" },
+      // A fresh database per run; a persisted file carries an earlier schema.
+      db: {
+        driver: "sqlite",
+        url: `file:${join(tmpdir(), `wrnexus-test-${process.pid}.db`)}`,
+      },
       observability: { exporter: "none", sampleRate: 0 },
     },
     staging: {