diff --git a/Cargo.lock b/Cargo.lock
index 89335512f3..152bd66b66 100644
--- a/Cargo.lock
+++ b/Cargo.lock
@@ -2878,6 +2878,7 @@ dependencies = [
 name = "libdd-capabilities-impl"
 version = "3.0.0"
 dependencies = [
+ "anyhow",
  "bytes",
  "http",
  "http-body-util",
diff --git a/libdd-capabilities-impl/Cargo.toml b/libdd-capabilities-impl/Cargo.toml
index f4da7baa45..a2310f51d8 100644
--- a/libdd-capabilities-impl/Cargo.toml
+++ b/libdd-capabilities-impl/Cargo.toml
@@ -16,6 +16,7 @@ crate-type = ["lib"]
 bench = false
 
 [dependencies]
+anyhow = "1.0"
 bytes = "1"
 http = "1"
 libdd-capabilities = { path = "../libdd-capabilities", version = "2.1.0" }
diff --git a/libdd-capabilities-impl/src/env.rs b/libdd-capabilities-impl/src/env.rs
new file mode 100644
index 0000000000..8bb6963019
--- /dev/null
+++ b/libdd-capabilities-impl/src/env.rs
@@ -0,0 +1,37 @@
+// Copyright 2026-Present Datadog, Inc. https://www.datadoghq.com/
+// SPDX-License-Identifier: Apache-2.0
+
+//! Native environment-variable capability backed by `std::env`.
+
+use std::env::VarError;
+
+use libdd_capabilities::env::{EnvCapability, EnvError};
+
+#[derive(Clone, Debug)]
+pub struct NativeEnvCapability;
+
+impl EnvCapability for NativeEnvCapability {
+    fn new() -> Self {
+        Self
+    }
+
+    fn get(&self, name: &str) -> Result<Option<String>, EnvError> {
+        match std::env::var(name) {
+            Ok(v) => Ok(Some(v)),
+            Err(VarError::NotPresent) => Ok(None),
+            Err(VarError::NotUnicode(_)) => Err(EnvError::NotUnicode(name.to_owned())),
+        }
+    }
+}
+
+#[cfg(test)]
+mod tests {
+    use super::*;
+
+    #[test]
+    fn get_absent_returns_none() {
+        let cap = NativeEnvCapability;
+        // A name unlikely to be set in any environment.
+        assert_eq!(cap.get("LIBDD_CAP_TEST_ABSENT_XYZZY").unwrap(), None);
+    }
+}
diff --git a/libdd-capabilities-impl/src/lib.rs b/libdd-capabilities-impl/src/lib.rs
index e2b48d7d74..68c1854ff6 100644
--- a/libdd-capabilities-impl/src/lib.rs
+++ b/libdd-capabilities-impl/src/lib.rs
@@ -7,21 +7,25 @@
 //! traits using platform-native backends (hyper for HTTP, tokio for sleep,
 //! etc.). Leaf crates (FFI, benchmarks) pin this type as the generic parameter.
 
+pub mod env;
 mod http;
 pub mod sleep;
 
 use core::future::Future;
 use std::time::Duration;
 
+pub use env::NativeEnvCapability;
 pub use http::NativeHttpClient;
 use libdd_capabilities::{http::HttpError, MaybeSend};
-pub use libdd_capabilities::{HttpClientCapability, LogWriterCapability, SleepCapability};
+pub use libdd_capabilities::{
+    EnvCapability, EnvError, HttpClientCapability, LogWriterCapability, SleepCapability,
+};
 pub use sleep::NativeSleepCapability;
 
 /// Bundle struct for native platform capabilities.
 ///
-/// Delegates to [`NativeHttpClient`] for HTTP and [`NativeSleepCapability`] for
-/// sleep. Task spawning is handled internally by `SharedRuntime`.
+/// Delegates to [`NativeHttpClient`] for HTTP and to unit-struct capabilities
+/// for the rest. Task spawning is handled internally by `SharedRuntime`.
 ///
 /// Individual capability traits keep minimal per-function bounds (e.g.
 /// functions that only need HTTP require just `H: HttpClientCapability`, not the
@@ -31,6 +35,7 @@ pub use sleep::NativeSleepCapability;
 pub struct NativeCapabilities {
     http: NativeHttpClient,
     sleep: NativeSleepCapability,
+    env: NativeEnvCapability,
 }
 
 impl Default for NativeCapabilities {
@@ -44,16 +49,14 @@ impl NativeCapabilities {
         Self {
             http: NativeHttpClient::new_client(),
             sleep: NativeSleepCapability,
+            env: NativeEnvCapability,
         }
     }
 }
 
 impl HttpClientCapability for NativeCapabilities {
     fn new_client() -> Self {
-        Self {
-            http: NativeHttpClient::new_client(),
-            sleep: NativeSleepCapability,
-        }
+        Self::new()
     }
 
     fn request(
@@ -78,13 +81,20 @@ impl LogWriterCapability for NativeCapabilities {
 
 impl SleepCapability for NativeCapabilities {
     fn new() -> Self {
-        Self {
-            http: NativeHttpClient::new_client(),
-            sleep: NativeSleepCapability,
-        }
+        Self::new()
     }
 
     fn sleep(&self, duration: Duration) -> impl Future<Output = ()> + MaybeSend {
         self.sleep.sleep(duration)
     }
 }
+
+impl EnvCapability for NativeCapabilities {
+    fn new() -> Self {
+        Self::new()
+    }
+
+    fn get(&self, name: &str) -> Result<Option<String>, EnvError> {
+        self.env.get(name)
+    }
+}
diff --git a/libdd-capabilities/src/env.rs b/libdd-capabilities/src/env.rs
new file mode 100644
index 0000000000..f464f74a2c
--- /dev/null
+++ b/libdd-capabilities/src/env.rs
@@ -0,0 +1,31 @@
+// Copyright 2026-Present Datadog, Inc. https://www.datadoghq.com/
+// SPDX-License-Identifier: Apache-2.0
+
+//! Environment-variable capability trait and error types.
+//!
+//! Sync: env access is a single map lookup on both native (`std::env`) and
+//! wasm (`process.env`).
+//!
+//! `set` and `unset` are intentionally absent from this trait. libdatadog is
+//! embedded in many kinds of runtime, where mutating the process environment
+//! very much unsafe. Exposing mutation here would make it trivially easy for
+//! callers to corrupt the environment of a multi-threaded host process.
+
+#[derive(Debug, thiserror::Error)]
+pub enum EnvError {
+    #[error("The value of the environment variable `{0}` is not valid UTF-8")]
+    NotUnicode(String),
+    #[error("IO error: {0}")]
+    Io(anyhow::Error),
+}
+
+pub trait EnvCapability: Clone + std::fmt::Debug {
+    fn new() -> Self;
+
+    /// Read an env var.
+    ///
+    /// `Ok(None)` means the variable is unset; `Err(NotUnicode)` means it is
+    /// set but its value is not valid UTF-8. Callers that treat "missing" and
+    /// "invalid" the same should collapse both branches explicitly.
+    fn get(&self, name: &str) -> Result<Option<String>, EnvError>;
+}
diff --git a/libdd-capabilities/src/lib.rs b/libdd-capabilities/src/lib.rs
index 1798946057..d4e5104b8e 100644
--- a/libdd-capabilities/src/lib.rs
+++ b/libdd-capabilities/src/lib.rs
@@ -3,12 +3,14 @@
 
 //! Portable capability traits for cross-platform libdatadog.
 
+pub mod env;
 pub mod http;
 pub mod log_output;
 pub mod maybe_send;
 pub mod sleep;
 pub mod spawn;
 
+pub use self::env::{EnvCapability, EnvError};
 pub use self::http::{HttpClientCapability, HttpError};
 pub use self::log_output::LogWriterCapability;
 pub use self::sleep::SleepCapability;