diff --git a/meta/recipes-extended/gawk/gawk/test-time.patch b/meta/recipes-extended/gawk/gawk/test-time.patch
new file mode 100644
index 0000000000..05a68c5faf
--- /dev/null
+++ b/meta/recipes-extended/gawk/gawk/test-time.patch
@@ -0,0 +1,22 @@
+The test time.awk does a sleep() and checks that the real sleep duration is
+close to the expected duration.
+
+As currently our tests can run on a heavily loaded system, increase the range of
+a passing duration.
+
+Upstream-Status: Inappropriate
+Signed-off-by: Ross Burton <ross.burton@arm.com>
+
+diff --git a/test/time.awk b/test/time.awk
+index 517377e2..ca81d92d 100644
+--- a/test/time.awk
++++ b/test/time.awk
+@@ -16,7 +16,7 @@ BEGIN {
+    printf "sleep(%s) = %s\n",delta,sleep(delta)
+    t1 = timecheck()
+    slept = t1-t0
+-   if ((slept < 0.9*delta) || (slept > 1.3*delta))
++   if ((slept < 0.5*delta) || (slept > 2*delta))
+       printf "Warning: tried to sleep %.2f secs, but slept for %.2f secs\n",
+ 	     delta,slept
+ }
diff --git a/meta/recipes-extended/gawk/gawk_5.1.0.bb b/meta/recipes-extended/gawk/gawk_5.1.0.bb
index 3c801e8bcc..0961efa897 100644
--- a/meta/recipes-extended/gawk/gawk_5.1.0.bb
+++ b/meta/recipes-extended/gawk/gawk_5.1.0.bb
@@ -18,6 +18,7 @@ PACKAGECONFIG[mpfr] = "--with-mpfr,--without-mpfr, mpfr"
 SRC_URI = "${GNU_MIRROR}/gawk/gawk-${PV}.tar.gz \
            file://run-ptest \
            file://0001-Use-cross-AR-during-compile.patch \
+           file://test-time.patch \
 "
 
 SRC_URI[md5sum] = "f719bc9966df28e67fc6ebc405e7ea03"