diff --git a/staging/src/k8s.io/apiserver/pkg/endpoints/filters/audit_init.go b/staging/src/k8s.io/apiserver/pkg/endpoints/filters/audit_init.go
index 7c9ca8e92665e..cd7d1d7de17b6 100644
--- a/staging/src/k8s.io/apiserver/pkg/endpoints/filters/audit_init.go
+++ b/staging/src/k8s.io/apiserver/pkg/endpoints/filters/audit_init.go
@@ -17,6 +17,8 @@ limitations under the License.
 package filters
 
 import (
+	"encoding/binary"
+	"math/rand/v2"
 	"net/http"
 
 	"k8s.io/apimachinery/pkg/types"
@@ -26,13 +28,33 @@ import (
 	"github.com/google/uuid"
 )
 
+// nonCryptoRandReader is an io.Reader backed by math/rand/v2 for generating
+// audit IDs without going through crypto/rand (which is expensive in FIPS mode).
+type nonCryptoRandReader struct{}
+
+func (nonCryptoRandReader) Read(b []byte) (int, error) {
+	for i := 0; i+8 <= len(b); i += 8 {
+		binary.NativeEndian.PutUint64(b[i:], rand.Uint64())
+	}
+	// handle trailing bytes
+	if tail := len(b) % 8; tail > 0 {
+		var buf [8]byte
+		binary.NativeEndian.PutUint64(buf[:], rand.Uint64())
+		copy(b[len(b)-tail:], buf[:tail])
+	}
+	return len(b), nil
+}
+
 // WithAuditInit initializes the audit context and attaches the Audit-ID associated with a request.
 //
 // a. If the caller does not specify a value for Audit-ID in the request header, we generate a new audit ID
 // b. We echo the Audit-ID value to the caller via the response Header 'Audit-ID'.
 func WithAuditInit(handler http.Handler) http.Handler {
+	// Audit IDs are correlation tokens, not security-sensitive. Use non-crypto
+	// randomness to avoid expensive FIPS-mode crypto/rand on every request.
+	reader := nonCryptoRandReader{}
 	return withAuditInit(handler, func() string {
-		return uuid.New().String()
+		return uuid.Must(uuid.NewRandomFromReader(reader)).String()
 	})
 }
 
diff --git a/staging/src/k8s.io/apiserver/pkg/endpoints/filters/audit_init_test.go b/staging/src/k8s.io/apiserver/pkg/endpoints/filters/audit_init_test.go
index c12b2879177bc..4f4ebd00d4889 100644
--- a/staging/src/k8s.io/apiserver/pkg/endpoints/filters/audit_init_test.go
+++ b/staging/src/k8s.io/apiserver/pkg/endpoints/filters/audit_init_test.go
@@ -26,6 +26,44 @@ import (
 	"k8s.io/apiserver/pkg/audit"
 )
 
+func TestWithAuditInitGeneratesValidUUIDv4(t *testing.T) {
+	var auditIDGot string
+	handler := http.HandlerFunc(func(_ http.ResponseWriter, req *http.Request) {
+		v, ok := audit.AuditIDFrom(req.Context())
+		if !ok {
+			t.Fatal("expected AuditIDFrom to return true")
+		}
+		auditIDGot = string(v)
+	})
+
+	wrapped := WithAuditInit(handler)
+
+	req, err := http.NewRequestWithContext(t.Context(), http.MethodGet, "/api/v1/namespaces", nil)
+	if err != nil {
+		t.Fatalf("failed to create request: %v", err)
+	}
+	// No Audit-ID header set — force generation.
+
+	w := httptest.NewRecorder()
+	wrapped.ServeHTTP(w, req)
+
+	parsed, err := uuid.Parse(auditIDGot)
+	if err != nil {
+		t.Fatalf("generated audit ID %q is not a valid UUID: %v", auditIDGot, err)
+	}
+	if parsed.Version() != 4 {
+		t.Errorf("expected UUID version 4, got %d", parsed.Version())
+	}
+	if parsed.Variant() != uuid.RFC4122 {
+		t.Errorf("expected RFC 4122 variant, got %v", parsed.Variant())
+	}
+
+	echoed := w.Header().Get("Audit-ID")
+	if echoed != auditIDGot {
+		t.Errorf("Audit-ID response header %q doesn't match context value %q", echoed, auditIDGot)
+	}
+}
+
 func TestWithAuditID(t *testing.T) {
 	largeAuditID := fmt.Sprintf("%s-%s", uuid.New().String(), uuid.New().String())
 	tests := []struct {