diff --git a/frontend/src/components/ChannelPage.tsx b/frontend/src/components/ChannelPage.tsx
index 25aaf63..6eb976c 100644
--- a/frontend/src/components/ChannelPage.tsx
+++ b/frontend/src/components/ChannelPage.tsx
@@ -68,12 +68,20 @@ export default function ChannelPage({
   const qc = useQueryClient();
   const confirm = useConfirm();
   const [tab, setTab] = useState<"videos" | "about">("videos");
+  // The banner URL is valid, but googleusercontent intermittently throttles it when the channel
+  // page fires the banner + avatar + ~16 thumbnails in one burst — the request is dropped and the
+  // browser then NEGATIVE-CACHES the miss, so the banner stays broken even though a retry would
+  // succeed. So on error we retry a few times with a cache-buster (forcing a fresh request), and
+  // only fall back to the blank bar if it keeps failing (a genuinely dead URL — rare).
+  const MAX_BANNER_RETRIES = 3;
+  const [bannerAttempt, setBannerAttempt] = useState(0);
 
   const detail = useQuery({
     queryKey: ["channel", channelId],
     queryFn: () => api.channelDetail(channelId),
   });
   const ch = detail.data;
+  useEffect(() => setBannerAttempt(0), [ch?.banner_url]); // fresh channel/banner → try again
 
   // Background auto-ingest ("explore") of an un-subscribed channel's uploads.
   const [nextToken, setNextToken] = useState<string | null | undefined>(undefined);
@@ -197,7 +205,7 @@ export default function ChannelPage({
     <main className="flex-1 min-w-0 overflow-y-auto [scrollbar-gutter:stable]">
       {/* Banner + back — OPTION C: inset, rounded card (not full-bleed) */}
       <div className="relative px-4 sm:px-6 pt-3">
-        {ch?.banner_url ? (
+        {ch?.banner_url && bannerAttempt <= MAX_BANNER_RETRIES ? (
           // Match YouTube's banner: the stored bannerExternalUrl is the full 16:9 template at a
           // low default size, so request a crisp wide version (=w1707) and object-cover the
           // desktop "safe area" — the centre 2560×423 (~6:1) band.
@@ -206,9 +214,17 @@ export default function ChannelPage({
             style={{ aspectRatio: "2560 / 423", maxHeight: "150px" }}
           >
             <img
-              src={`${ch.banner_url}=w1707`}
+              // key forces a fresh <img> per attempt; the ?r= cache-buster on a retry bypasses the
+              // browser's negative cache (googleusercontent accepts an extra query param).
+              key={bannerAttempt}
+              src={`${ch.banner_url}=w1707${bannerAttempt ? `?r=${bannerAttempt}` : ""}`}
               alt=""
               className="w-full h-full object-cover object-center"
+              onError={() => {
+                if (bannerAttempt <= MAX_BANNER_RETRIES) {
+                  window.setTimeout(() => setBannerAttempt((a) => a + 1), 500 * (bannerAttempt + 1));
+                }
+              }}
             />
           </div>
         ) : (