diff --git a/benchmarks/SkiaSharp.Benchmarks/Benchmarks/SKFourByteTagParseBenchmark.cs b/benchmarks/SkiaSharp.Benchmarks/Benchmarks/SKFourByteTagParseBenchmark.cs
new file mode 100644
index 00000000000..b105139603f
--- /dev/null
+++ b/benchmarks/SkiaSharp.Benchmarks/Benchmarks/SKFourByteTagParseBenchmark.cs
@@ -0,0 +1,67 @@
+using System;
+using BenchmarkDotNet.Attributes;
+
+namespace SkiaSharp.Benchmarks;
+
+// New vs Old for SKFourByteTag.Parse(string).
+//
+// Old = the current shipped implementation (allocates a char[4] scratch buffer per call).
+// New = the proposed managed fast path (no allocation; reads chars directly).
+//
+// The real caller shape is font/OpenType tag hydration: feature tags ("liga", "kern"),
+// variation-axis tags ("wght", "wdth", "slnt"), and table tags parsed from strings, often a
+// batch of many at once when configuring a font. This benchmark parses a representative batch
+// of such tags (plus null/empty/short/over-long edges) so both the happy path and the padding
+// branches are exercised.
+[MemoryDiagnoser]
+public class SKFourByteTagParseBenchmark
+{
+	private string[] tags;
+
+	[GlobalSetup]
+	public void GlobalSetup()
+	{
+		// A realistic mix of 4-char tags, plus edge shapes that hit the padding/truncation code.
+		tags = new[]
+		{
+			"liga", "kern", "wght", "wdth", "slnt", "ital", "opsz", "GSUB",
+			"GPOS", "cmap", "head", "name", "OS/2", "post", "glyf", "loca",
+			"a",    "bc",   "def",  "toolong", "", null,
+		};
+	}
+
+	[Benchmark(Baseline = true)]
+	public uint Old()
+	{
+		uint sink = 0;
+		foreach (var t in tags)
+			sink ^= OldParse(t);
+		return sink;
+	}
+
+	[Benchmark]
+	public uint New()
+	{
+		uint sink = 0;
+		foreach (var t in tags)
+			sink ^= (uint)SKFourByteTag.Parse(t);
+		return sink;
+	}
+
+	// Verbatim copy of the ORIGINAL shipped Parse(string) body, so the ratio is honest.
+	private static uint OldParse(string tag)
+	{
+		if (string.IsNullOrEmpty(tag))
+			return 0;
+
+		var realTag = new char[4];
+		var len = Math.Min(4, tag.Length);
+		var i = 0;
+		for (; i < len; i++)
+			realTag[i] = tag[i];
+		for (; i < 4; i++)
+			realTag[i] = ' ';
+
+		return (uint)(((byte)realTag[0] << 24) | ((byte)realTag[1] << 16) | ((byte)realTag[2] << 8) | (byte)realTag[3]);
+	}
+}
diff --git a/binding/SkiaSharp/SKFourByteTag.cs b/binding/SkiaSharp/SKFourByteTag.cs
index c77ad4ea5fd..7905aa3ff37 100644
--- a/binding/SkiaSharp/SKFourByteTag.cs
+++ b/binding/SkiaSharp/SKFourByteTag.cs
@@ -16,20 +16,24 @@ public SKFourByteTag (char c1, char c2, char c3, char c4)
 		value = (uint)(((byte)c1 << 24) | ((byte)c2 << 16) | ((byte)c3 << 8) | (byte)c4);
 	}
 
-	public static SKFourByteTag Parse (string? tag)
+	public static SKFourByteTag Parse (string? tag) =>
+		Parse (tag.AsSpan ());
+
+	public static SKFourByteTag Parse (ReadOnlySpan<char> tag)
 	{
-		if (string.IsNullOrEmpty (tag))
+		if (tag.IsEmpty)
 			return new SKFourByteTag (0);
 
-		var realTag = new char[4];
-		var len = Math.Min (4, tag!.Length);
-		var i = 0;
-		for (; i < len; i++)
-			realTag[i] = tag[i];
-		for (; i < 4; i++)
-			realTag[i] = ' ';
+		// Take up to the first four characters, padding any missing trailing
+		// slots with spaces — matching the original char[4]-scratch behaviour
+		// without allocating the scratch array. The first character always
+		// exists here because empty input was handled by the guard above.
+		var c1 = tag[0];
+		var c2 = tag.Length > 1 ? tag[1] : ' ';
+		var c3 = tag.Length > 2 ? tag[2] : ' ';
+		var c4 = tag.Length > 3 ? tag[3] : ' ';
 
-		return new SKFourByteTag (realTag[0], realTag[1], realTag[2], realTag[3]);
+		return new SKFourByteTag (c1, c2, c3, c4);
 	}
 
 	public override string ToString () =>
diff --git a/tests/Tests/SkiaSharp/SKFourByteTagTest.cs b/tests/Tests/SkiaSharp/SKFourByteTagTest.cs
index 08872dd2964..a8cb56fd1ba 100644
--- a/tests/Tests/SkiaSharp/SKFourByteTagTest.cs
+++ b/tests/Tests/SkiaSharp/SKFourByteTagTest.cs
@@ -118,6 +118,62 @@ public void FourByteTagEqualsObjectWorks ()
 			Assert.False (tag.Equals ("wght")); // wrong type
 		}
 
+		// Expected values are precomputed constants rather than the output of a runtime reference
+		// implementation, so the oracle can never silently drift along with the code under test.
+		// Each expected value is the big-endian packing of the low byte of the first four UTF-16
+		// code units, padding any missing trailing slots with spaces (0x20) and treating
+		// null/empty as zero.
+		[Theory]
+		[InlineData (null, 0x00000000u)]
+		[InlineData ("", 0x00000000u)]
+		[InlineData (" ", 0x20202020u)]
+		[InlineData ("a", 0x61202020u)]
+		[InlineData ("ab", 0x61622020u)]
+		[InlineData ("abc", 0x61626320u)]
+		[InlineData ("abcd", 0x61626364u)]
+		[InlineData ("abcde", 0x61626364u)]
+		[InlineData ("abcdef", 0x61626364u)]
+		[InlineData ("wght", 0x77676874u)]
+		[InlineData ("wdth", 0x77647468u)]
+		[InlineData ("slnt", 0x736C6E74u)]
+		[InlineData ("opsz", 0x6F70737Au)]
+		[InlineData ("ital", 0x6974616Cu)]
+		[InlineData ("GSUB", 0x47535542u)]
+		[InlineData ("GPOS", 0x47504F53u)]
+		[InlineData ("OS/2", 0x4F532F32u)]
+		[InlineData ("    ", 0x20202020u)]
+		[InlineData ("\0\0\0\0", 0x00000000u)]
+		[InlineData ("\t\r\n ", 0x090D0A20u)]
+		// characters above 0xFF: only the low byte is kept
+		[InlineData ("\u0100\u0141\u2764\uFFFF", 0x004164FFu)]
+		[InlineData ("\u00e9\u00e9\u00ffz", 0xE9E9FF7Au)]
+		[InlineData ("\uABCDwgh", 0xCD776768u)]
+		// surrogate code units are still just char code units to the algorithm
+		[InlineData ("\uD83D\uDE00xy", 0x3D007879u)]
+		public void FourByteTagParseProducesExpectedValue (string input, uint expected)
+		{
+			// Both the string overload and the span overload must produce the same constant.
+			Assert.Equal (expected, (uint)SKFourByteTag.Parse (input));
+			Assert.Equal (expected, (uint)SKFourByteTag.Parse (input.AsSpan ()));
+		}
+
+		[Fact]
+		public void FourByteTagParseSpanFromSlicedStringMatches ()
+		{
+			// A span carved out of a larger string (no substring allocation) must parse the same
+			// as the equivalent standalone string.
+			const string source = "xxwghtyy";
+			var slice = source.AsSpan (2, 4);
+			Assert.Equal ((uint)SKFourByteTag.Parse ("wght"), (uint)SKFourByteTag.Parse (slice));
+		}
+
+		[Fact]
+		public void FourByteTagParseEmptySpanReturnsZero ()
+		{
+			Assert.Equal (0u, (uint)SKFourByteTag.Parse (ReadOnlySpan<char>.Empty));
+			Assert.Equal (0u, (uint)SKFourByteTag.Parse (default (ReadOnlySpan<char>)));
+		}
+
 		[Fact]
 		public void FourByteTagSurvivesNativeRoundTrip ()
 		{