diff --git a/scripts/generate-last-updated.mjs b/scripts/generate-last-updated.mjs
index 4962a6d35..1425f554e 100644
--- a/scripts/generate-last-updated.mjs
+++ b/scripts/generate-last-updated.mjs
@@ -13,7 +13,7 @@
 import fs from 'fs'
 import path from 'path'
 import { fileURLToPath } from 'url'
-import { getGitLastModified } from './git-dates.mjs'
+import { buildGitDateMap } from './git-dates.mjs'
 
 const __dirname = path.dirname(fileURLToPath(import.meta.url))
 const ROOT = path.join(__dirname, '..')
@@ -45,9 +45,10 @@ const entries = findMdxRoutes(PAGES_DIR)
   .filter((r) => r.route !== '/' && r.route !== '')
   .sort((a, b) => a.route.localeCompare(b.route))
 
+const gitDates = buildGitDateMap()
 const map = {}
 for (const { route, filePath } of entries) {
-  const date = getGitLastModified(filePath)
+  const date = gitDates.get(path.relative(ROOT, filePath))
   if (date) map[route] = date
 }
 
diff --git a/scripts/generate-sitemap.mjs b/scripts/generate-sitemap.mjs
index daa81af01..b9c0615ab 100644
--- a/scripts/generate-sitemap.mjs
+++ b/scripts/generate-sitemap.mjs
@@ -10,7 +10,7 @@
 import fs from 'fs'
 import path from 'path'
 import { fileURLToPath } from 'url'
-import { getGitLastModified } from './git-dates.mjs'
+import { buildGitDateMap } from './git-dates.mjs'
 
 const __dirname = path.dirname(fileURLToPath(import.meta.url))
 const ROOT = path.join(__dirname, '..')
@@ -56,10 +56,11 @@ function escapeXml(s) {
     .replace(/'/g, ''')
 }
 
+const gitDates = buildGitDateMap()
 const entries = findMdxFiles(PAGES_DIR)
   .map(({ route, filePath }) => ({
     url: toPublicUrl(route),
-    lastmod: getGitLastModified(filePath),
+    lastmod: gitDates.get(path.relative(ROOT, filePath)) ?? null,
   }))
   .sort((a, b) => a.url.localeCompare(b.url))
 
diff --git a/scripts/git-dates.mjs b/scripts/git-dates.mjs
index 423967385..4912d3903 100644
--- a/scripts/git-dates.mjs
+++ b/scripts/git-dates.mjs
@@ -3,6 +3,9 @@ import { execSync } from 'child_process'
 /**
  * Get the last modified date for a file from git history.
  * Returns YYYY-MM-DD or null if the file is not tracked / git is unavailable.
+ *
+ * Prefer buildGitDateMap() when you need dates for many files — this spawns a
+ * git process per call, which is ~300x slower across a full page tree.
  */
 export function getGitLastModified(filePath) {
   try {
@@ -16,3 +19,47 @@ export function getGitLastModified(filePath) {
     return null
   }
 }
+
+let _dateMapCache
+
+/**
+ * Build a map of repo-relative path -> last commit date (YYYY-MM-DD) for every
+ * file in history, in a SINGLE git process, instead of one `git log` per file.
+ * Memoised for the lifetime of the process.
+ *
+ * git log is reverse-chronological, so the first date seen for a path is its
+ * most recent commit — the same value `git log -1 -- <path>` returns. Paths are
+ * repo-relative with forward slashes, matching path.relative(repoRoot, file).
+ *
+ * Returns an empty map if git is unavailable (e.g. inside the Docker image,
+ * which has no git binary); callers then fall back to no date, exactly as the
+ * per-file getGitLastModified() did.
+ */
+export function buildGitDateMap() {
+  if (_dateMapCache) return _dateMapCache
+  const map = new Map()
+  try {
+    // core.quotePath=false keeps non-ASCII paths unquoted so line parsing is safe.
+    const out = execSync(
+      'git -c core.quotePath=false log --format=%cI --name-only',
+      {
+        encoding: 'utf-8',
+        maxBuffer: 128 * 1024 * 1024,
+        stdio: ['pipe', 'pipe', 'ignore'],
+      }
+    )
+    let currentDate = null
+    for (const line of out.split('\n')) {
+      if (line === '') continue
+      if (/^\d{4}-\d{2}-\d{2}T/.test(line)) {
+        currentDate = line.slice(0, 10)
+        continue
+      }
+      if (currentDate && !map.has(line)) map.set(line, currentDate)
+    }
+  } catch {
+    // git unavailable — return the empty map, callers fall back to null.
+  }
+  _dateMapCache = map
+  return map
+}