diff --git a/backend/pom.xml b/backend/pom.xml
index 03a1e4ac..7ac0a6a5 100644
--- a/backend/pom.xml
+++ b/backend/pom.xml
@@ -215,6 +215,14 @@
 			<groupId>io.opentelemetry.instrumentation</groupId>
 			<artifactId>opentelemetry-spring-boot-starter</artifactId>
 			<version>2.27.0</version>
+			<exclusions>
+				<!-- Excludes AzureAppServiceResourceProvider which references ServiceAttributes.SERVICE_INSTANCE_ID
+				     that does not exist in the semconv version pulled by this project. -->
+				<exclusion>
+					<groupId>io.opentelemetry.contrib</groupId>
+					<artifactId>opentelemetry-azure-resources</artifactId>
+				</exclusion>
+			</exclusions>
 		</dependency>
 	</dependencies>
 
diff --git a/backend/src/test/resources/application-test.yaml b/backend/src/test/resources/application-test.yaml
index b561b54e..06a4ada1 100644
--- a/backend/src/test/resources/application-test.yaml
+++ b/backend/src/test/resources/application-test.yaml
@@ -14,6 +14,12 @@ spring:
   mail:
     host: localhost
 
+# Disable OTel SDK entirely in tests — prevents auto-configuration from loading resource providers
+# (e.g. AzureAppServiceResourceProvider) that fail against the semconv version used here.
+otel:
+  sdk:
+    disabled: true
+
 # Disable trace export in tests — prevents OTLP connection attempts when no Tempo is running.
 # Sampling probability 0.0 means no spans are created, so no export is attempted.
 management: