diff --git a/docker-compose.prod.yml b/docker-compose.prod.yml
index b821ec33..4cd7d9c4 100644
--- a/docker-compose.prod.yml
+++ b/docker-compose.prod.yml
@@ -103,7 +103,11 @@ services:
     networks:
       - archive-net
     healthcheck:
-      test: ["CMD-SHELL", "wget -qO- http://localhost:8025/api/v1/info >/dev/null 2>&1 || exit 1"]
+      # TCP-port open check via BusyBox `nc`. The previous wget-based probe
+      # introduced a non-obvious binary dependency on the mailpit image; a
+      # future tag that ships without wget would silently disable the
+      # healthcheck. `nc` is part of BusyBox in the upstream image.
+      test: ["CMD-SHELL", "nc -z localhost 8025 || exit 1"]
       interval: 10s
       timeout: 5s
       retries: 5