diff --git a/unstructured/metrics/utils.py b/unstructured/metrics/utils.py
index c490aa752b..2db44c64fd 100644
--- a/unstructured/metrics/utils.py
+++ b/unstructured/metrics/utils.py
@@ -6,7 +6,9 @@
 from typing import List, Optional, Union
 
 import click
+import numpy as np
 import pandas as pd
+from numba import njit
 
 from unstructured.staging.base import elements_from_json, elements_to_text
 
@@ -214,12 +216,15 @@ def _pstdev(scores: List[Optional[float]], rounding: Optional[int] = 3) -> Union
     Args:
         rounding (int): optional argument that allows user to define decimal points. Default at 3.
     """
-    scores = [score for score in scores if score is not None]
-    if len(scores) <= 1:
+    # Convert to float array, filtering None (preserve original behavior)
+    clean_scores = [score for score in scores if score is not None]
+    if len(clean_scores) <= 1:
         return None
+    arr = np.array(clean_scores, dtype=np.float64)
+    std = _numba_pstdev(arr)
     if not rounding:
-        return statistics.pstdev(scores)
-    return round(statistics.pstdev(scores), rounding)
+        return std
+    return round(std, rounding)
 
 
 def _count(scores: List[Optional[float]]) -> float:
@@ -244,3 +249,21 @@ def _read_text_file(path):
     except OSError as e:
         # Handle other I/O related errors
         raise IOError(f"An error occurred when reading the file at {path}: {e}")
+
+
+@njit(cache=True, fastmath=True)
+def _numba_pstdev(arr: np.ndarray) -> float:
+    """
+    Numba-accelerated population standard deviation (stddev, not sample) for a 1D float64 numpy array,
+    matching the semantics of statistics.pstdev.
+    """
+    n = arr.size
+    mean = 0.0
+    for i in range(n):
+        mean += arr[i]
+    mean /= n
+    ssd = 0.0
+    for i in range(n):
+        diff = arr[i] - mean
+        ssd += diff * diff
+    return (ssd / n) ** 0.5