diff --git a/frontend/packages/agent/src/Root.tsx b/frontend/packages/agent/src/Root.tsx
index f3b15400..36079502 100644
--- a/frontend/packages/agent/src/Root.tsx
+++ b/frontend/packages/agent/src/Root.tsx
@@ -72,6 +72,17 @@ export function Root() {
   const [openPanel, setOpenPanel] = useState<OpenPanel>(null);
   const liveStreamRef = useRef<LiveStreamHandle>(null);
 
+  // Ticks the status badge's "thinking Xm Ys" age once a second,
+  // independent of the ~4s `/api/state` poll cadence — without its own
+  // clock the age text only advances when a poll happens to land, so it
+  // visibly stair-steps instead of counting up, and freezes outright for
+  // however long a poll is delayed (e.g. a backgrounded tab).
+  const [now, setNow] = useState(() => Date.now());
+  useEffect(() => {
+    const id = setInterval(() => setNow(Date.now()), 1000);
+    return () => clearInterval(id);
+  }, []);
+
   // Browser tab title — ports app.js's setHeader logic verbatim: prefer
   // the human display name + hive_name ("iris // pr1ma") so tabs read
   // naturally; fall back to the qualified domain label for multi-hive
@@ -175,7 +186,7 @@ export function Root() {
   // idle/thinking reading from before the harness went offline).
   const effectiveTurnState = state.status === 'online' ? state.turn_state : 'offline';
   const turnDef = STATE_LABELS[effectiveTurnState] ?? { glyph: '○', text: 'offline', tone: 'negative' as BadgeTone };
-  const stateAge = fmtAge(Date.now() - state.turn_state_since * 1000);
+  const stateAge = fmtAge(now - state.turn_state_since * 1000);
   // Consolidated status badge (mara: "why do we have separate alive
   // badge? ... one badge that shows thinking / idle / paused").
   // Not online → the alive-table's own reading (rate-limited/needs-login/
diff --git a/frontend/packages/agent/src/hooks/useAgentState.ts b/frontend/packages/agent/src/hooks/useAgentState.ts
index 306d8e49..4893ecb1 100644
--- a/frontend/packages/agent/src/hooks/useAgentState.ts
+++ b/frontend/packages/agent/src/hooks/useAgentState.ts
@@ -1,5 +1,10 @@
 // useAgentState — polls `GET /api/state` every 4s and exposes the latest
-// snapshot + loading/error status.
+// snapshot + loading/error status. Also resyncs immediately whenever the
+// tab regains visibility: a backgrounded tab's `setTimeout` chain gets
+// throttled/frozen by the browser, so the last snapshot — and anything
+// the UI derives from it, like the turn-state badge's elapsed-time text —
+// goes stale until something proactively refetches; without this the
+// only way back to a live reading was a full page reload.
 import { useEffect, useRef, useState } from 'preact/hooks';
 import type { AgentState } from '../types.js';
 
@@ -18,6 +23,15 @@ export function useAgentState(): UseAgentStateResult {
   const [error, setError] = useState<string | null>(null);
   const timerRef = useRef<ReturnType<typeof setTimeout> | null>(null);
   const stoppedRef = useRef(false);
+  // Holds the mount effect's self-rescheduling `poll` so `refresh()` can
+  // invoke the *same* function instead of a parallel one-off fetch — a
+  // fresh call still runs through `poll`'s own `setTimeout(poll, …)` tail,
+  // so the loop stays alive afterwards instead of dying silently the
+  // first time something calls `refresh()` (see the review discussion on
+  // this file's PR: an earlier version of `refresh()` did its own
+  // one-off fetch with no reschedule, which permanently killed periodic
+  // polling the first time a caller invoked it).
+  const pollRef = useRef<() => void>(() => {});
 
   useEffect(() => {
     stoppedRef.current = false;
@@ -37,6 +51,7 @@ export function useAgentState(): UseAgentStateResult {
         timerRef.current = setTimeout(poll, RETRY_MS);
       }
     }
+    pollRef.current = poll;
     poll();
 
     return () => {
@@ -47,21 +62,29 @@ export function useAgentState(): UseAgentStateResult {
 
   function refresh() {
     if (timerRef.current) clearTimeout(timerRef.current);
-    // Re-trigger the same poll loop immediately; the effect's closure
-    // owns `poll`, so the simplest safe re-trigger from outside it is a
-    // fresh fetch here rather than reaching back into the effect.
     stoppedRef.current = false;
-    fetch('api/state')
-      .then((resp) => {
-        if (!resp.ok) throw new Error(`http ${resp.status}`);
-        return resp.json();
-      })
-      .then((s: AgentState) => {
-        setState(s);
-        setError(null);
-      })
-      .catch((err) => setError(err instanceof Error ? err.message : String(err)));
+    pollRef.current();
   }
 
+  // A backgrounded/hidden tab has its `setTimeout` chain throttled by the
+  // browser (Chrome et al throttle nested timers heavily once hidden, and
+  // may suspend the page outright) — the `poll()` loop above effectively
+  // stalls, and everything derived from `state` (not just the fetch
+  // itself) goes stale until it happens to fire again. Force a resync the
+  // moment the tab becomes visible so switching back doesn't leave a
+  // reading that's minutes old. Empty deps: `refresh` only closes over
+  // refs and setState setters, both stable across renders, so the first
+  // render's closure stays correct for the component's whole lifetime —
+  // and, unlike re-subscribing on every render, doesn't re-attach this
+  // listener every second now that `Root`'s own 1s ticker re-renders the
+  // component that calls this hook.
+  useEffect(() => {
+    function onVisible() {
+      if (document.visibilityState === 'visible') refresh();
+    }
+    document.addEventListener('visibilitychange', onVisible);
+    return () => document.removeEventListener('visibilitychange', onVisible);
+  }, []);
+
   return { state, error, refresh };
 }