diff --git a/deploy/observability/otel-log-collector.yaml b/deploy/observability/otel-log-collector.yaml
index 887c904..e84f2ed 100644
--- a/deploy/observability/otel-log-collector.yaml
+++ b/deploy/observability/otel-log-collector.yaml
@@ -24,6 +24,11 @@ data:
         limit_mib: 96
       batch:
         timeout: 5s
+        # Loki's internal gRPC push limit is 4 MiB. start_at: beginning replays
+        # whole files after a restart, so an uncapped batch exceeds it and the
+        # exporter retries the same oversized request forever.
+        send_batch_size: 1000
+        send_batch_max_size: 2000
 
     exporters:
       otlphttp/loki: