diff --git a/crates/oak-app/src/oakui/real.rs b/crates/oak-app/src/oakui/real.rs
index 4a2b477c2..eb06e6efa 100644
--- a/crates/oak-app/src/oakui/real.rs
+++ b/crates/oak-app/src/oakui/real.rs
@@ -246,8 +246,14 @@ enum FullResTarget {
 // that fall out of the window (or whose params were invalidated) release
 // their slots back to the workers.
 
-/// The default forward pre-render window (frames).
-pub const DEFAULT_PREVIEW_WINDOW_FORWARD: i64 = 120;
+/// The default forward pre-render window (frames). Kept small: each
+/// frame is slow on some hardware (multi-clip montage decodes through
+/// FFmpeg), and a large window queues far ahead of the playhead — the
+/// workers never catch up, the painted frame lags seconds behind the
+/// crown and playback looks frozen. A shorter window bounds the backlog
+/// to what the pool can render in a fraction of a second, so the
+/// displayed frame tracks the playhead instead of chasing it.
+pub const DEFAULT_PREVIEW_WINDOW_FORWARD: i64 = 12;
 /// Config key for the forward pre-render window size (frames).
 pub const CONFIG_KEY_PREVIEW_WINDOW: &str = "PlaybackPreRenderFrames";
 
diff --git a/crates/oak-app/src/panels/multicam.rs b/crates/oak-app/src/panels/multicam.rs
index 7cb10782f..dba516255 100644
--- a/crates/oak-app/src/panels/multicam.rs
+++ b/crates/oak-app/src/panels/multicam.rs
@@ -61,6 +61,13 @@ use crate::panels::chip;
 /// The number of sources refreshed per tick during playback (the rest keep
 /// their last frame until their turn — the task's round-robin throttle).
 const PLAYBACK_REFRESH_PER_TICK: i32 = 2;
+/// A refresh cycle runs once every this many ticks (a tick is one frame
+/// at the sequence rate). Decoding one angle is an FFmpeg keyframe-
+/// scanning seek (~10-50 ms even on a 720p proxy); re-requesting ALL
+/// sources EVERY tick made those seek costs compound and starved the
+/// main viewer's worker pool. The grid still refreshes each source in
+/// turn, just at a third of the frame rate.
+const PLAYBACK_REFRESH_STRIDE: i32 = 3;
 
 /// One pending switch (the C++ `MulticamWidget`'s `play_queue_`): the
 /// switch applies once the program playhead reaches `target`.
@@ -92,6 +99,10 @@ pub struct MulticamPanel<E: AppEngine> {
 	play_queue: VecDeque<QueuedSwitch>,
 	/// Round-robin cursor over the sources (playback refresh throttle).
 	refresh_cursor: i32,
+	/// Tick counter for the playback refresh cycle (stride-scaled).
+	refresh_tick_toggle: u64,
+	/// The refresh cycle seen last (dedups re-requests within a cycle).
+	last_refresh_cycle: i64,
 	/// The last program playhead (detects a jump / rest).
 	last_playhead: i64,
 	/// Set when a switch cleared the frames: the next refresh pass covers
@@ -121,6 +132,8 @@ impl<E: AppEngine> MulticamPanel<E> {
 			frames: HashMap::new(),
 			play_queue: VecDeque::new(),
 			refresh_cursor: 0,
+			refresh_tick_toggle: 0,
+			last_refresh_cycle: -1,
 			last_playhead: i64::MIN,
 			full_refresh: true,
 			focus: _cx.focus_handle(),
@@ -177,12 +190,21 @@ impl<E: AppEngine> MulticamPanel<E> {
 			}
 			self.refresh_cursor = 0;
 		} else {
-			// Playback: round-robin a couple of sources per tick.
-			for _ in 0..state.source_count.min(PLAYBACK_REFRESH_PER_TICK) {
-				let source = self.refresh_cursor % state.source_count;
-				self.refresh_cursor += 1;
-				self.request_angle(source, cx);
+			// Playback: one refresh cycle per PLAYBACK_REFRESH_STRIDE
+			// ticks, round-robin a couple of sources per cycle (the old
+			// per-tick round-robin requested decodes faster than they can
+			// complete — each is a keyframe-scanning seek and stole the
+			// main viewer's worker capacity).
+			let cycle = (self.refresh_tick_toggle / PLAYBACK_REFRESH_STRIDE as u64) as i64;
+			if cycle != self.last_refresh_cycle {
+				self.last_refresh_cycle = cycle;
+				for _ in 0..state.source_count.min(PLAYBACK_REFRESH_PER_TICK) {
+					let source = self.refresh_cursor % state.source_count;
+					self.refresh_cursor += 1;
+					self.request_angle(source, cx);
+				}
 			}
+			self.refresh_tick_toggle = self.refresh_tick_toggle.wrapping_add(1);
 		}
 		self.full_refresh = false;
 		self.last_playhead = playhead;
diff --git a/crates/oak-render/src/eval.rs b/crates/oak-render/src/eval.rs
index 431aeb091..7f5110497 100644
--- a/crates/oak-render/src/eval.rs
+++ b/crates/oak-render/src/eval.rs
@@ -1304,11 +1304,21 @@ pub fn render_graph_frame(
 	let mut perf_collect = perf.then(std::time::Instant::now);
 	let mut perf_collect_ms = 0.0f64;
 	let mut frames: Vec<Frame> = Vec::new();
-	for clip in clips {
+	let mut perf_clip_hist: Vec<(oak_node::id::NodeId, f64)> = Vec::new();
+	for clip in clips.clone() {
+		let clip_sw = perf.then(std::time::Instant::now);
 		let request = oak_node::traverser::EvalRequest::new(clip, time);
 		let table = traverser.evaluate(graph, &request, &mut hooks).map_err(|e| {
 			Error::Failed(format!("graph evaluation of clip {clip:?} failed: {e:?}"))
 		})?;
+		if perf {
+			perf_clip_hist.push((
+				clip,
+				clip_sw
+					.map(|t| t.elapsed().as_secs_f64() * 1000.0)
+					.unwrap_or(0.0),
+			));
+		}
 		if let Some(t0) = &perf_collect {
 			perf_collect_ms += t0.elapsed().as_secs_f64() * 1000.0;
 			perf_collect = Some(std::time::Instant::now());
@@ -1337,6 +1347,9 @@ pub fn render_graph_frame(
 		let composite_ms = composite_started
 			.map(|t| t.elapsed().as_secs_f64() * 1000.0)
 			.unwrap_or(0.0);
+		for (clip, ms) in &perf_clip_hist {
+			eprintln!("[perf]   clip {clip:?} evaluate {ms:.1}ms");
+		}
 		eprintln!(
 			"[perf] graph frame time {time:?} size {size:?}: evaluate {perf_collect_ms:.1}ms composite {composite_ms:.1}ms total {}ms",
 			perf_collect_ms + composite_ms