diff --git a/web/deploy/nginx.conf b/web/deploy/nginx.conf
index 6ae19b5..69614fb 100644
--- a/web/deploy/nginx.conf
+++ b/web/deploy/nginx.conf
@@ -49,6 +49,14 @@ server {
         proxy_pass http://api:8000;
     }
 
+    # Operational health probe — reaches the api liveness endpoint
+    # without going through the SPA fallback. Useful for ad-hoc curl
+    # and for ingress / load-balancer health checks that target the
+    # web pod (k8s probes hit the api pod directly via Service).
+    location = /health {
+        proxy_pass http://api:8000/health;
+    }
+
     # Static asset cache headers (Vite emits hashed filenames so this is
     # safe for the long-tail).
     location ~* \.(js|css|woff2?|svg|png|jpg|jpeg|gif|ico)$ {