diff --git a/packages/web/src/pages/search-explore-page/components/desktop/FeaturedRemixContestsSection.tsx b/packages/web/src/pages/search-explore-page/components/desktop/FeaturedRemixContestsSection.tsx
index 1466cbd0624..20444134b71 100644
--- a/packages/web/src/pages/search-explore-page/components/desktop/FeaturedRemixContestsSection.tsx
+++ b/packages/web/src/pages/search-explore-page/components/desktop/FeaturedRemixContestsSection.tsx
@@ -1,4 +1,4 @@
-import { useExploreContent } from '@audius/common/api'
+import { useAllRemixContests, useExploreContent } from '@audius/common/api'
 import { exploreMessages as messages } from '@audius/common/messages'
 import { route } from '@audius/common/utils'
 import { Box } from '@audius/harmony'
@@ -10,6 +10,11 @@ import { CONTEST_CARD_WIDTH } from './constants'
 import { useExploreSectionTracking } from './useExploreSectionTracking'
 
 const SKELETON_COUNT = 6
+// Big enough to cover the featured set with headroom — the All Contests
+// endpoint primes a per-track entry-count cache as a side-effect (see
+// `useAllRemixContests` queryFn). One batched fetch here replaces ~N
+// per-card count-only fetches from `useRemixesCount` inside ContestCard.
+const PRIME_BATCH_SIZE = 30
 
 export const FeaturedRemixContestsSection = () => {
   const { ref, inView } = useExploreSectionTracking('Featured Remix Contests')
@@ -18,6 +23,12 @@ export const FeaturedRemixContestsSection = () => {
     enabled: inView
   })
 
+  // Side-effect: fetch+prime entry counts for the featured contests so
+  // ContestCard's `useRemixesCount` hits cache instead of firing a
+  // count-only request per card. The return value is intentionally
+  // unused — we only care about the priming inside the hook's queryFn.
+  useAllRemixContests({ pageSize: PRIME_BATCH_SIZE }, { enabled: inView })
+
   if (isError || (isSuccess && !data?.featuredRemixContests?.length)) {
     return null
   }