diff --git a/Dockerfile b/Dockerfile
index 6ae0a91..6f37b60 100644
--- a/Dockerfile
+++ b/Dockerfile
@@ -1,5 +1,8 @@
 FROM node:20-alpine
 
+# Install curl explicitly for the healthcheck (wget in alpine has had IPv6/connection-resolved quirks)
+RUN apk add --no-cache curl
+
 # Create app directory and data directory for the persistent volume
 WORKDIR /app
 RUN mkdir -p /data
@@ -19,8 +22,10 @@ ENV PORT=3000 \
 EXPOSE 3000
 
 # Healthcheck for Coolify / orchestrators
-HEALTHCHECK --interval=30s --timeout=3s --start-period=10s --retries=3 \
-  CMD wget -q --spider http://localhost:3000/api/health || exit 1
+# Use 127.0.0.1 (IPv4 explicit) to avoid IPv6 connection-refused races.
+# Generous start-period because Node + Alpine cold-start can take ~30-60s on first deploy.
+HEALTHCHECK --interval=20s --timeout=5s --start-period=60s --retries=8 \
+  CMD curl -fsS http://127.0.0.1:3000/api/health || exit 1
 
 # Run as non-root for safety
 RUN addgroup -S app && adduser -S app -G app && chown -R app:app /app /data