diff --git a/tools/testing/selftests/net/ovpn/common.sh b/tools/testing/selftests/net/ovpn/common.sh
index 2d844eb3aa6e..de96d333ee2b 100644
--- a/tools/testing/selftests/net/ovpn/common.sh
+++ b/tools/testing/selftests/net/ovpn/common.sh
@@ -178,20 +178,14 @@ ovpn_setup_ns() {
 
 ovpn_build_capture_filter() {
 	# match the first four bytes of the openvpn data payload
-	if [ "${OVPN_PROTO}" == "UDP" ]; then
-		# For UDP, libpcap transport indexing only works for IPv4, so
-		# use an explicit IPv4 or IPv6 expression based on the peer
-		# address. The IPv6 branch assumes there are no extension
-		# headers in the outer packet.
-		if [[ "${2}" == *:* ]]; then
-			printf "ip6 and ip6[6] = 17 and ip6[48:4] = %s" "${1}"
-		else
-			printf "ip and udp[8:4] = %s" "${1}"
-		fi
+	# For UDP, libpcap transport indexing only works for IPv4, so
+	# use an explicit IPv4 or IPv6 expression based on the peer
+	# address. The IPv6 branch assumes there are no extension
+	# headers in the outer packet.
+	if [[ "${2}" == *:* ]]; then
+		printf "ip6 and ip6[6] = 17 and ip6[48:4] = %s" "${1}"
 	else
-		# openvpn over TCP prepends a 2-byte packet length ahead of the
-		# DATA_V2 opcode, so skip it before matching the payload header
-		printf "ip and tcp[(((tcp[12] & 0xf0) >> 2) + 2):4] = %s" "${1}"
+		printf "ip and udp[8:4] = %s" "${1}"
 	fi
 }
 
diff --git a/tools/testing/selftests/net/ovpn/ovpn-cli.c b/tools/testing/selftests/net/ovpn/ovpn-cli.c
index f4effa7580c0..6b458a654a33 100644
--- a/tools/testing/selftests/net/ovpn/ovpn-cli.c
+++ b/tools/testing/selftests/net/ovpn/ovpn-cli.c
@@ -470,6 +470,18 @@ static int ovpn_parse_key_direction(const char *dir, struct ovpn_ctx *ctx)
 	return 0;
 }
 
+static int ovpn_tcp_nodelay(int socket)
+{
+	int opt = 1;
+	int ret;
+
+	ret = setsockopt(socket, IPPROTO_TCP, TCP_NODELAY, &opt, sizeof(opt));
+	if (ret < 0)
+		perror("setsockopt for TCP_NODELAY");
+
+	return ret;
+}
+
 static int ovpn_socket(struct ovpn_ctx *ctx, sa_family_t family, int proto)
 {
 	struct sockaddr_storage local_sock = { 0 };
@@ -606,6 +618,12 @@ static int ovpn_accept(struct ovpn_ctx *ctx)
 		goto err;
 	}
 
+	if (ovpn_tcp_nodelay(ret) < 0) {
+		close(ret);
+		ret = -1;
+		goto err;
+	}
+
 	return ret;
 err:
 	close(ctx->socket);
@@ -623,6 +641,10 @@ static int ovpn_connect(struct ovpn_ctx *ovpn)
 		return -1;
 	}
 
+	ret = ovpn_tcp_nodelay(s);
+	if (ret < 0)
+		goto err;
+
 	switch (ovpn->remote.in4.sin_family) {
 	case AF_INET:
 		socklen = sizeof(struct sockaddr_in);
diff --git a/tools/testing/selftests/net/ovpn/test.sh b/tools/testing/selftests/net/ovpn/test.sh
index 9b5610837032..d744c1a97d5f 100755
--- a/tools/testing/selftests/net/ovpn/test.sh
+++ b/tools/testing/selftests/net/ovpn/test.sh
@@ -67,35 +67,33 @@ ovpn_run_basic_traffic() {
 	local tcpdump_timeout="1.5s"
 
 	for p in $(seq 1 ${OVPN_NUM_PEERS}); do
-		# The first part of the data packet header consists of:
-		# - TCP only: 2 bytes for the packet length
-		# - 5 bits for opcode ("9" for DATA_V2)
-		# - 3 bits for key-id ("0" at this point)
-		# - 12 bytes for peer-id:
-		#     - with asymmetric ID: "${p}" one way and "${p} + 9" the
-		#	other way
-		#     - with symmetric ID: "${p}" both ways
-		header1=$(printf "0x4800000%x" ${p})
-		header2=$(printf "0x4800000%x" $((p + OVPN_ID_OFFSET)))
-		raddr=""
 		if [ "${OVPN_PROTO}" == "UDP" ]; then
+			# The first part of the data packet header consists of:
+			# - 5 bits for opcode ("9" for DATA_V2)
+			# - 3 bits for key-id ("0" at this point)
+			# - 3 bytes for peer-id:
+			#     - with asymmetric ID: "${p}" one way and "${p} + 9" the
+			#	other way
+			#     - with symmetric ID: "${p}" both ways
+			header1=$(printf "0x4800000%x" ${p})
+			header2=$(printf "0x4800000%x" $((p + OVPN_ID_OFFSET)))
 			raddr=$(awk "NR == ${p} {print \$3}" \
 				"${OVPN_UDP_PEERS_FILE}")
+			peer_ns="ovpn_peer${p}"
+
+			timeout ${tcpdump_timeout} ip netns exec "${peer_ns}" \
+				tcpdump --immediate-mode -p -ni veth${p} -c 1 \
+				"$(ovpn_build_capture_filter "${header1}" "${raddr}")" \
+				>/dev/null 2>&1 &
+			tcpdump_pid1=$!
+			timeout ${tcpdump_timeout} ip netns exec "${peer_ns}" \
+				tcpdump --immediate-mode -p -ni veth${p} -c 1 \
+				"$(ovpn_build_capture_filter "${header2}" "${raddr}")" \
+				>/dev/null 2>&1 &
+			tcpdump_pid2=$!
+
+			sleep 0.3
 		fi
-		peer_ns="ovpn_peer${p}"
-
-		timeout ${tcpdump_timeout} ip netns exec "${peer_ns}" \
-			tcpdump --immediate-mode -p -ni veth${p} -c 1 \
-			"$(ovpn_build_capture_filter "${header1}" "${raddr}")" \
-			>/dev/null 2>&1 &
-		tcpdump_pid1=$!
-		timeout ${tcpdump_timeout} ip netns exec "${peer_ns}" \
-			tcpdump --immediate-mode -p -ni veth${p} -c 1 \
-			"$(ovpn_build_capture_filter "${header2}" "${raddr}")" \
-			>/dev/null 2>&1 &
-		tcpdump_pid2=$!
-
-		sleep 0.3
 		ovpn_cmd_ok "send baseline traffic to peer ${p}" \
 			ip netns exec ovpn_peer0 \
 			ping -qfc 100 -w 3 5.5.5.$((p + 1))
@@ -103,8 +101,10 @@ ovpn_run_basic_traffic() {
 			ip netns exec ovpn_peer0 \
 			ping -qfc 100 -s 3000 -w 3 5.5.5.$((p + 1))
 
-		wait "${tcpdump_pid1}" || return 1
-		wait "${tcpdump_pid2}" || return 1
+		if [ "${OVPN_PROTO}" == "UDP" ]; then
+			wait "${tcpdump_pid1}" || return 1
+			wait "${tcpdump_pid2}" || return 1
+		fi
 	done
 }