Telling a friend the truth they don’t want to hear is a risk to the friendship. Saying nothing is a bigger one.

Speaking costs you a bad week and possibly a cold stretch between you. Saying nothing costs something larger and slower: they find out eventually that you could see it and chose the comfortable option, and the friendship is quietly reclassified. Part of what makes a close friendship close is the standing assumption that you would tell each other.

Say it once, privately, in a way that leaves them room to disagree, then stop. One clear conversation is support. The same point repeated weekly becomes something else and they will stop listening.