diff --git a/build.gradle b/build.gradle
index 1f471d3e26..dfdd63d87f 100644
--- a/build.gradle
+++ b/build.gradle
@@ -275,6 +275,11 @@ project('ooxml') {
     }
 
     japicmp.baseline = "org.apache.poi:poi:${japicmpversion}@jar"
+
+	test {
+        // for some reason catching the OOM does not work when run from Gradle
+        exclude '**/MemoryUsage.class'
+    }
 }
 
 project('examples') {