diff --git a/app/hooks/use-form.ts b/app/hooks/use-form.ts
index a81b786a0a..75f6085050 100644
--- a/app/hooks/use-form.ts
+++ b/app/hooks/use-form.ts
@@ -8,14 +8,12 @@
 import { type FieldValues, type UseFormProps, useForm as _useForm } from 'react-hook-form'
 
 /**
- * Same as built-in `useForm` except `mode: 'onTouched'` is hard-coded and the
- * caller can't set it. `onTouched` means the first validation on a field is
- * triggered by blur, after which it updates with every change.
- *
+ * Same as built-in `useForm` except we can hard-code some props and prevent the
+ * caller from setting them.
  * See https://react-hook-form.com/docs/useform#mode
  */
 export function useForm<TFieldValues extends FieldValues = FieldValues>(
   props?: Omit<UseFormProps<TFieldValues>, 'mode'>
 ) {
-  return _useForm({ mode: 'onTouched', ...props })
+  return _useForm({ mode: 'onSubmit', ...props })
 }
diff --git a/app/test/e2e/instance-create.e2e.ts b/app/test/e2e/instance-create.e2e.ts
index f580baf4e9..34cf965dd3 100644
--- a/app/test/e2e/instance-create.e2e.ts
+++ b/app/test/e2e/instance-create.e2e.ts
@@ -107,13 +107,16 @@ test('can create an instance with custom hardware', async ({ page }) => {
 
   // test disk size validation against image size
   await diskSizeInput.fill('5')
-  await diskSizeInput.blur() // need blur to trigger validation
+
+  const submitButton = page.getByRole('button', { name: 'Create instance' })
+  await submitButton.click() // submit to trigger validation
+
   await expectVisible(page, [
     'main >> text=Must be as large as selected image (min. 6 GiB)',
   ])
   await diskSizeInput.fill('10')
 
-  await page.getByRole('button', { name: 'Create instance' }).click()
+  await submitButton.click()
 
   await expect(page).toHaveURL(`/projects/mock-project/instances/${instanceName}/storage`)
 
diff --git a/app/test/e2e/project-create.e2e.ts b/app/test/e2e/project-create.e2e.ts
index 0520156bac..dc4e9c4360 100644
--- a/app/test/e2e/project-create.e2e.ts
+++ b/app/test/e2e/project-create.e2e.ts
@@ -32,9 +32,10 @@ test.describe('Project create', () => {
   test('shows field-level validation error and does not POST', async ({ page }) => {
     await page.fill('role=textbox[name="Name"]', 'Invalid name')
 
-    await page.click('role=textbox[name="Description"]') // just to blur name input
-    // role=dialog to distinguish from live announce
-    await expectVisible(page, ['role=dialog >> text="Must start with a lower-case letter"'])
+    // submit to trigger validation
+    await page.getByRole('button', { name: 'Create project' }).click()
+
+    await expect(page.getByText('Must start with a lower-case letter').nth(0)).toBeVisible()
   })
 
   test('shows form-level error for known server error', async ({ page }) => {