diff --git a/lib/path/tests/default.nix b/lib/path/tests/default.nix
index 50d40cdfa476..93aea798acca 100644
--- a/lib/path/tests/default.nix
+++ b/lib/path/tests/default.nix
@@ -6,16 +6,19 @@
     overlays = [];
     inherit system;
   },
+  nixVersions ? import ../../tests/nix-for-tests.nix { inherit pkgs; },
   libpath ? ../..,
   # Random seed
   seed ? null,
 }:
+
 pkgs.runCommand "lib-path-tests" {
-  nativeBuildInputs = with pkgs; [
-    nix
+  nativeBuildInputs = [
+    nixVersions.stable
+  ] ++ (with pkgs; [
     jq
     bc
-  ];
+  ]);
 } ''
   # Needed to make Nix evaluation work
   export TEST_ROOT=$(pwd)/test-tmp
diff --git a/lib/tests/nix-for-tests.nix b/lib/tests/nix-for-tests.nix
new file mode 100644
index 000000000000..69dedece3874
--- /dev/null
+++ b/lib/tests/nix-for-tests.nix
@@ -0,0 +1,17 @@
+{ pkgs
+}:
+
+# The aws-sdk-cpp tests are flaky.  Since pull requests to staging
+# cause nix to be rebuilt, this means that staging PRs end up
+# getting false CI failures due to whatever is flaky in the AWS
+# SDK tests.  Since none of our CI needs to (or should be able to)
+# contact AWS S3, let's just omit it all from the Nix that runs
+# CI.  Bonus: the tests build way faster.
+#
+# See also: https://github.com/NixOS/nix/issues/7582
+
+builtins.mapAttrs (_: pkg:
+  if builtins.isAttrs pkg
+  then pkg.override { withAWS = false; }
+  else pkg)
+  pkgs.nixVersions
diff --git a/lib/tests/release.nix b/lib/tests/release.nix
index c8d6b810122e..1286ccf385ff 100644
--- a/lib/tests/release.nix
+++ b/lib/tests/release.nix
@@ -1,8 +1,9 @@
 { # The pkgs used for dependencies for the testing itself
   # Don't test properties of pkgs.lib, but rather the lib in the parent directory
   pkgs ? import ../.. {} // { lib = throw "pkgs.lib accessed, but the lib tests should use nixpkgs' lib path directly!"; },
-  nix ? pkgs.nix,
-  nixVersions ? [ pkgs.nixVersions.minimum nix pkgs.nixVersions.unstable ],
+  nix ? pkgs-nixVersions.stable,
+  nixVersions ? [ pkgs-nixVersions.minimum nix pkgs-nixVersions.unstable ],
+  pkgs-nixVersions ? import ./nix-for-tests.nix { inherit pkgs; },
 }:
 
 let