diff --git a/src/dorkbox/network/Client.kt b/src/dorkbox/network/Client.kt
index c1d3d58a..532fbc2c 100644
--- a/src/dorkbox/network/Client.kt
+++ b/src/dorkbox/network/Client.kt
@@ -493,7 +493,8 @@ open class Client<CONNECTION : Connection>(
                 aeronDriver.start()
 
                 // short delay, since it failed we want to limit the retry rate to something slower than "as fast as the CPU can do it"
-                delay(500)
+                // we also want to go at SLIGHTLY slower that the aeron driver timeout frequency, this way - if there are connection or handshake issues, the server has the chance to expire the connections.
+                delay(aeronDriver.driverTimeout()+1)
                 if (logger.isTraceEnabled) {
                     logger.trace(e) { "Unable to connect to '$remoteAddressString', retrying..." }
                 } else {
diff --git a/src/dorkbox/network/aeron/AeronDriver.kt b/src/dorkbox/network/aeron/AeronDriver.kt
index 5823ef82..9923ef0d 100644
--- a/src/dorkbox/network/aeron/AeronDriver.kt
+++ b/src/dorkbox/network/aeron/AeronDriver.kt
@@ -488,6 +488,14 @@ class AeronDriver(
         }
     }
 
+    /**
+     * @return the aeron driver timeout
+     */
+    fun driverTimeout(): Long {
+        return context.driverTimeout
+    }
+
+
     /**
      * @return the aeron media driver log file for a specific publication. This should be removed when a publication is closed (but is not always!)
      */