diff --git a/packages/api/internal/template-manager/cache_scope.go b/packages/api/internal/template-manager/cache_scope.go
new file mode 100644
index 0000000000..524a5ee800
--- /dev/null
+++ b/packages/api/internal/template-manager/cache_scope.go
@@ -0,0 +1,38 @@
+package template_manager
+
+import (
+	"os"
+	"sync"
+
+	"github.com/google/uuid"
+)
+
+// templateCacheScopeEnv, when set to a non-empty value, overrides the per-team
+// layer cache scope with a single shared scope so that identical content-
+// addressed layers (and the buildID-keyed memfile/rootfs they resolve to) are
+// stored and reused across teams instead of once per team.
+//
+// Default (unset): the scope is the teamID, preserving upstream per-team cache
+// isolation. Only set this in a single trusted organization / self-hosted
+// deployment where cross-team cache sharing is acceptable: a shared scope lets
+// any team hit (and thus prove the existence of, and reuse) another team's
+// cached layers.
+const templateCacheScopeEnv = "TEMPLATE_CACHE_SCOPE"
+
+var (
+	cacheScopeOnce   sync.Once
+	cacheScopeShared string
+)
+
+// cacheScopeFor returns the layer cache scope for a build owned by teamID.
+// If TEMPLATE_CACHE_SCOPE is set it returns that shared scope for every team
+// (cross-team dedup); otherwise it returns the teamID (per-team isolation).
+func cacheScopeFor(teamID uuid.UUID) string {
+	cacheScopeOnce.Do(func() {
+		cacheScopeShared = os.Getenv(templateCacheScopeEnv)
+	})
+	if cacheScopeShared != "" {
+		return cacheScopeShared
+	}
+	return teamID.String()
+}
diff --git a/packages/api/internal/template-manager/create_template.go b/packages/api/internal/template-manager/create_template.go
index 66e38301a5..ff00927282 100644
--- a/packages/api/internal/template-manager/create_template.go
+++ b/packages/api/internal/template-manager/create_template.go
@@ -157,7 +157,7 @@ func (tm *TemplateManager) CreateTemplate(
 	_, err = client.Template.TemplateCreate(
 		ctx, &templatemanagergrpc.TemplateCreateRequest{
 			Template:   template,
-			CacheScope: new(teamID.String()),
+			CacheScope: new(cacheScopeFor(teamID)),
 			Version:    &version,
 		},
 	)
diff --git a/packages/api/internal/template-manager/upload_template_layer_files.go b/packages/api/internal/template-manager/upload_template_layer_files.go
index 13e3c08fee..d60c755fd5 100644
--- a/packages/api/internal/template-manager/upload_template_layer_files.go
+++ b/packages/api/internal/template-manager/upload_template_layer_files.go
@@ -18,7 +18,7 @@ func (tm *TemplateManager) InitLayerFileUpload(ctx context.Context, clusterID uu
 
 	resp, err := client.Template.InitLayerFileUpload(
 		ctx, &templatemanager.InitLayerFileUploadRequest{
-			CacheScope: new(teamID.String()),
+			CacheScope: new(cacheScopeFor(teamID)),
 			TemplateID: templateID,
 			Hash:       hash,
 		},