diff --git a/clients/src/main/java/org/apache/kafka/common/record/CompressionType.java b/clients/src/main/java/org/apache/kafka/common/record/CompressionType.java
index 352d12d834977..cf6a026d0a526 100644
--- a/clients/src/main/java/org/apache/kafka/common/record/CompressionType.java
+++ b/clients/src/main/java/org/apache/kafka/common/record/CompressionType.java
@@ -119,7 +119,9 @@ public InputStream wrapForInput(ByteBuffer inputBuffer, byte messageVersion, Buf
         @Override
         public OutputStream wrapForOutput(ByteBufferOutputStream buffer, byte messageVersion) {
             try {
-                return (OutputStream) ZstdConstructors.OUTPUT.invoke(buffer);
+                // Set input buffer (uncompressed) to 16 KB (none by default) to ensure reasonable performance
+                // in cases where the caller passes a small number of bytes to write (potentially a single byte)
+                return new BufferedOutputStream((OutputStream) ZstdConstructors.OUTPUT.invoke(buffer), 16 * 1024);
             } catch (Throwable e) {
                 throw new KafkaException(e);
             }
@@ -128,7 +130,9 @@ public OutputStream wrapForOutput(ByteBufferOutputStream buffer, byte messageVer
         @Override
         public InputStream wrapForInput(ByteBuffer buffer, byte messageVersion, BufferSupplier decompressionBufferSupplier) {
             try {
-                return (InputStream) ZstdConstructors.INPUT.invoke(new ByteBufferInputStream(buffer));
+                // Set output buffer (uncompressed) to 16 KB (none by default) to ensure reasonable performance
+                // in cases where the caller reads a small number of bytes (potentially a single byte)
+                return new BufferedInputStream((InputStream) ZstdConstructors.INPUT.invoke(new ByteBufferInputStream(buffer)), 16 * 1024);
             } catch (Throwable e) {
                 throw new KafkaException(e);
             }
diff --git a/gradle/dependencies.gradle b/gradle/dependencies.gradle
index bb9d4d421752f..5a6ec990d8ace 100644
--- a/gradle/dependencies.gradle
+++ b/gradle/dependencies.gradle
@@ -116,7 +116,7 @@ versions += [
   testRetryPlugin: "1.1.6",
   zinc: "1.3.5",
   zookeeper: "3.5.8",
-  zstd: "1.4.5-6"
+  zstd: "1.4.5-12"
 ]
 libs += [
   activation: "javax.activation:activation:$versions.activation",