diff --git a/docusaurus.config.js b/docusaurus.config.js
index 59ad65d9b9..ab3e2d9f2e 100644
--- a/docusaurus.config.js
+++ b/docusaurus.config.js
@@ -92,6 +92,37 @@ module.exports = {
         href: "https://keploy.io/",
       },
     },
+    // Algolia search
+    {
+      tagName: "link",
+      attributes: {
+        rel: "preconnect",
+        href: "https://WZTL8PLCOD-dsn.algolia.net",
+        crossorigin: "anonymous",
+      },
+    },
+    // Analytics (dns-prefetch only — not render-blocking)
+    {
+      tagName: "link",
+      attributes: {
+        rel: "dns-prefetch",
+        href: "https://www.clarity.ms",
+      },
+    },
+    {
+      tagName: "link",
+      attributes: {
+        rel: "dns-prefetch",
+        href: "https://www.googletagmanager.com",
+      },
+    },
+    {
+      tagName: "link",
+      attributes: {
+        rel: "dns-prefetch",
+        href: "https://www.google-analytics.com",
+      },
+    },
     // Site-wide entity graph (Organization, WebSite, SoftwareApplication).
     // These used to be three sibling <script> blocks, each re-declaring its
     // own publisher, which left several disconnected Organization nodes on
diff --git a/netlify.toml b/netlify.toml
index 2104fcf940..b11a2413ba 100644
--- a/netlify.toml
+++ b/netlify.toml
@@ -9,7 +9,38 @@
 ## Note: if you are looking for Redirects
 # they have been moved to /static/_redirects to make it more manageable - swyx
 
-# Security headers for all pages
+# ── Performance: Cache headers ────────────────────────────────────────────────
+# Hashed JS/CSS bundles emitted by Docusaurus/webpack → safe to cache 1 year
+[[headers]]
+  for = "/docs/assets/*"
+  [headers.values]
+    Cache-Control = "public, max-age=31536000, immutable"
+
+# Static images served from /img
+[[headers]]
+  for = "/img/*"
+  [headers.values]
+    Cache-Control = "public, max-age=86400, stale-while-revalidate=604800"
+
+# Fonts are NOT content-hashed (e.g. Roboto-Bold.woff2) so immutable is unsafe.
+# Use a 1-week cache with stale-while-revalidate instead.
+[[headers]]
+  for = "/fonts/*"
+  [headers.values]
+    Cache-Control = "public, max-age=604800, stale-while-revalidate=86400"
+
+# Static JS helpers (non-hashed scripts in /docs/js and /docs/scripts)
+[[headers]]
+  for = "/js/*"
+  [headers.values]
+    Cache-Control = "public, max-age=86400"
+
+[[headers]]
+  for = "/scripts/*"
+  [headers.values]
+    Cache-Control = "public, max-age=86400"
+
+# ── Security headers (improves PageSpeed Best Practices score) ──────────────
 [[headers]]
   for = "/*"
   [headers.values]
diff --git a/src/components/responsive-player/ResponsivePlayer.js b/src/components/responsive-player/ResponsivePlayer.js
index d08af04c3e..9237b9e2c7 100644
--- a/src/components/responsive-player/ResponsivePlayer.js
+++ b/src/components/responsive-player/ResponsivePlayer.js
@@ -1,5 +1,9 @@
-import React from "react";
-import ReactPlayer from "react-player";
+import React, {Suspense, lazy} from "react";
+
+// Lazy-load react-player so it is NOT included in the initial JS bundle.
+// react-player/lazy defers loading the actual player implementation until
+// the component is rendered, reducing the first-page-load JS payload.
+const ReactPlayer = lazy(() => import("react-player/lazy"));
 
 function ResponsivePlayer({url, loop, playing}) {
   return (
@@ -7,16 +11,31 @@ function ResponsivePlayer({url, loop, playing}) {
       className="relative rounded-lg shadow-lg"
       style={{paddingTop: "56.25%"}}
     >
-      {/* /* Player ratio: 100 / (1280 / 720) */}
-      <ReactPlayer
-        className="absolute left-0 top-0"
-        url={url}
-        loop={loop}
-        playing={playing}
-        width="100%"
-        height="100%"
-        controls={true}
-      />
+      {/* Player ratio: 100 / (1280 / 720) */}
+      <Suspense
+        fallback={
+          <div
+            className="absolute left-0 top-0 flex h-full w-full items-center justify-center bg-gray-100 dark:bg-gray-800"
+            role="status"
+            aria-label="Loading video player"
+          >
+            <div className="h-8 w-8 animate-spin rounded-full border-2 border-gray-400 border-t-transparent dark:border-gray-500" />
+            <span className="ml-3 text-sm font-medium text-gray-600 dark:text-gray-300">
+              Loading video player...
+            </span>
+          </div>
+        }
+      >
+        <ReactPlayer
+          className="absolute left-0 top-0"
+          url={url}
+          loop={loop}
+          playing={playing}
+          width="100%"
+          height="100%"
+          controls={true}
+        />
+      </Suspense>
     </div>
   );
 }
diff --git a/src/css/custom.css b/src/css/custom.css
index d1a620b60c..fc0f468a16 100644
--- a/src/css/custom.css
+++ b/src/css/custom.css
@@ -812,7 +812,8 @@ td img {
   margin: 0;
 }
 
-.codeBlockContainer_node_modules-\@docusaurus-theme-classic-lib-next-theme-CodeBlock-styles-module {
+[class^="codeBlockContainer_"],
+[class*=" codeBlockContainer_"] {
   box-shadow: none !important;
   margin: 0;
   padding: 0;
@@ -3214,3 +3215,50 @@ html[data-theme="dark"] .docs-inline-footer__slack {
     font-size: 0.95rem;
   }
 }
+
+/* ===== PERFORMANCE: Rendering & paint optimisations ===== */
+
+/*
+ * content-visibility: auto — lets the browser skip layout/paint for
+ * off-screen sections, reducing LCP and INP on mobile.
+ * contain-intrinsic-size gives the browser a size estimate so the
+ * scroll-bar doesn't jump when content is rendered.
+ */
+footer,
+.footer {
+  content-visibility: auto;
+  contain-intrinsic-size: 0 200px;
+}
+
+/* Sidebar is always below the fold on small viewports */
+@media (max-width: 996px) {
+  .theme-doc-sidebar-container {
+    content-visibility: auto;
+    contain-intrinsic-size: 0 600px;
+  }
+}
+
+/*
+ * Lazy-decoded images — any <img> without an explicit loading attribute
+ * should at minimum decode off the main thread.
+ */
+img:not([loading]) {
+  decoding: async;
+}
+
+/*
+ * Reduce paint layers for the announcement bar (it's a position:sticky
+ * element and can cause extra compositing cost on mobile).
+ * Using attribute substring selector to avoid relying on a hashed class name
+ * that changes between Docusaurus builds.
+ */
+[class*="announcementBar"] {
+  will-change: auto;
+  transform: translateZ(0);
+}
+
+/*
+ * Font-display: swap is configured per @font-face declaration in
+ * src/fonts. Docusaurus-injected Google Fonts links already include
+ * &display=swap in the URL, so no additional override is needed here.
+ */