diff --git a/server/tests/unit/uploads-dirs.test.ts b/server/tests/unit/uploads-dirs.test.ts
new file mode 100644
index 000000000..691b36b2a
--- /dev/null
+++ b/server/tests/unit/uploads-dirs.test.ts
@@ -0,0 +1,43 @@
+import { describe, it, expect } from 'vitest';
+import fs from 'node:fs';
+import path from 'node:path';
+
+// The set of uploads subdirectories is hand-mirrored between the image build and
+// the boot-time mkdir in server/src/index.ts. Drift is invisible until a user on
+// a host whose bind-mounted uploads dir isn't writable by node hits an EACCES on
+// first upload to the missing dir (#1762), so pin the two copies together.
+const repoRoot = path.resolve(__dirname, '../../..');
+
+const readSubdirs = (file: string, pattern: RegExp): Set<string> => {
+  const source = fs.readFileSync(path.join(repoRoot, file), 'utf8');
+  const found = new Set<string>();
+  for (const m of source.matchAll(pattern)) found.add(m[1]);
+  return found;
+};
+
+describe('uploads subdirectory parity', () => {
+  const fromDockerfile = readSubdirs('Dockerfile', /\/app\/uploads\/([A-Za-z0-9_-]+)/g);
+  const fromBoot = readSubdirs('server/src/index.ts', /path\.join\(uploadsDir, '([A-Za-z0-9_-]+)'\)/g);
+
+  it('finds both lists (guards against the regexes silently matching nothing)', () => {
+    expect(fromDockerfile.size).toBeGreaterThan(0);
+    expect(fromBoot.size).toBeGreaterThan(0);
+  });
+
+  it('creates the same uploads subdirs in the Dockerfile and at boot', () => {
+    expect([...fromBoot].sort()).toEqual([...fromDockerfile].sort());
+  });
+
+  it('covers every uploads subdir the server writes to', () => {
+    // journey/ and places/ are written by journey.controller.ts and
+    // services/placeImage.ts; the rest are the long-standing upload stores.
+    expect([...fromBoot].sort()).toEqual([
+      'avatars',
+      'covers',
+      'files',
+      'journey',
+      'photos',
+      'places',
+    ]);
+  });
+});