diff --git a/CHANGELOG.md b/CHANGELOG.md
index 4776f95d5..0a57da866 100644
--- a/CHANGELOG.md
+++ b/CHANGELOG.md
@@ -86,6 +86,8 @@ and this project adheres to [Semantic Versioning](https://semver.org/spec/v2.0.0
   until the handler finishes. ([#1384])
 
 ### Fixed
+- `HTTP.sniff`, and `servecontent` without a `content_type`, now compile under
+  `juliac --trim=safe`. Content sniffing no longer dispatches at runtime.
 - Requests with a zero-length streaming body can be copied for retries and
   redirects. The first send retains and closes the producer; later sends replay
   the empty payload without trying to clone the producer.
diff --git a/src/http_sniff.jl b/src/http_sniff.jl
index 5d7d05d79..61336f3a3 100644
--- a/src/http_sniff.jl
+++ b/src/http_sniff.jl
@@ -1,4 +1,4 @@
-# Content sniffing helpers used by multipart/form request bodies.
+# Content sniffing for `sniff`, multipart/form request bodies, and `servecontent`.
 
 const _SNIFF_MAX_LENGTH = 512
 const _SNIFF_WHITESPACE = Set{UInt8}([UInt8('\t'), UInt8('\n'), UInt8('\u000c'), UInt8('\r'), UInt8(' ')])
@@ -258,7 +258,10 @@ function _sniff_match(::_SniffJSONSig, data::AbstractVector{UInt8}, firstnonws::
     return true
 end
 
-const _SNIFF_SIGNATURES = Any[
+# Checked in order before `_SNIFF_FALLBACK_SIGNATURES`. Keep each list to at
+# most four concrete types so inference union-splits the `_sniff_match` and
+# `_sniff_content_type` calls into static dispatch (required by `juliac --trim`).
+const _SNIFF_SIGNATURES = Union{_SniffHTMLSig,_SniffMasked,_SniffExact}[
     _SniffHTMLSig(collect(codeunits("<!DOCTYPE HTML"))),
     _SniffHTMLSig(collect(codeunits("<HTML"))),
     _SniffHTMLSig(collect(codeunits("<HEAD"))),
@@ -316,11 +319,10 @@ const _SNIFF_SIGNATURES = Any[
     _SniffExact(UInt8[0x52, 0x61, 0x72, 0x20, 0x1A, 0x07, 0x00], "application/x-rar-compressed"),
     _SniffExact(UInt8[0x50, 0x4B, 0x03, 0x04], "application/zip"),
     _SniffExact(UInt8[0x1F, 0x8B, 0x08], "application/x-gzip"),
-    _SniffMP4Sig(),
-    _SniffJSONSig(),
-    _SniffTextSig(),
 ]
 
+const _SNIFF_FALLBACK_SIGNATURES = (_SniffMP4Sig(), _SniffJSONSig(), _SniffTextSig())
+
 function sniff(data::AbstractString)::String
     bytes = collect(codeunits(String(data)))
     return sniff(bytes)
@@ -344,5 +346,8 @@ function sniff(data::AbstractVector{UInt8})::String
     for sig in _SNIFF_SIGNATURES
         _sniff_match(sig, bytes, firstnonws) && return _sniff_content_type(sig)
     end
+    for sig in _SNIFF_FALLBACK_SIGNATURES
+        _sniff_match(sig, bytes, firstnonws) && return _sniff_content_type(sig)
+    end
     return "application/octet-stream"
 end
diff --git a/test/http_trim_open_fileserver.jl b/test/http_trim_open_fileserver.jl
index f5ae84775..ab37ad828 100644
--- a/test/http_trim_open_fileserver.jl
+++ b/test/http_trim_open_fileserver.jl
@@ -27,6 +27,11 @@ function run_http_trim_open_fileserver()::Nothing
 
         dotted_route = handler(HT.Request("GET", "/gallery.v2"))
         dotted_route.status == 404 || error("expected dotted route status 404")
+
+        # Without `content_type` or a typed `name`, servecontent sniffs the body.
+        sniffed = HT.servecontent(HT.Request("GET", "/"), collect(codeunits("<html><p>hi</p></html>")))
+        HT.header(sniffed, "Content-Type") == "text/html; charset=utf-8" || error("unexpected sniffed content type")
+        HT.sniff("{\"ok\":true}") == "application/json; charset=utf-8" || error("unexpected sniffed JSON content type")
     finally
         trim_shutdown_runtime()
     end