diff --git a/lucene/CHANGES.txt b/lucene/CHANGES.txt
index 5ae094c6ed64..b3114ad9e995 100644
--- a/lucene/CHANGES.txt
+++ b/lucene/CHANGES.txt
@@ -151,6 +151,10 @@ Improvements
 
 Optimizations
 ---------------------
+* GITHUB#16382: WildcardQuery.toAutomaton now collapses consecutive unescaped '*'
+  wildcards into a single any-string automaton, avoiding a quadratic blow-up in
+  automaton size for patterns with many repeated asterisks. (Vismay Tiwari)
+
 * GITHUB#16307: ReqExclBulkScorer now skips runs of excluded docs via
   TwoPhaseIterator#docIDRunEnd for two-phase excluded clauses (e.g. a doc-values
   not-equals filter), instead of advancing one doc at a time. (Jim Ferenczi)
diff --git a/lucene/core/src/java/org/apache/lucene/search/WildcardQuery.java b/lucene/core/src/java/org/apache/lucene/search/WildcardQuery.java
index 9c1e8c223ed5..b92bdb9d0827 100644
--- a/lucene/core/src/java/org/apache/lucene/search/WildcardQuery.java
+++ b/lucene/core/src/java/org/apache/lucene/search/WildcardQuery.java
@@ -64,7 +64,6 @@ public WildcardQuery(Term term, RewriteMethod rewriteMethod) {
    *
    * @lucene.internal
    */
-  @SuppressWarnings("fallthrough")
   public static Automaton toAutomaton(Term wildcardquery) {
     List<Automaton> automata = new ArrayList<>();
 
@@ -74,22 +73,26 @@ public static Automaton toAutomaton(Term wildcardquery) {
       final int c = wildcardText.codePointAt(i);
       int length = Character.charCount(c);
       switch (c) {
-        case WILDCARD_STRING:
-          automata.add(Automata.makeAnyString());
-          break;
-        case WILDCARD_CHAR:
-          automata.add(Automata.makeAnyChar());
-          break;
-        case WILDCARD_ESCAPE:
-          // add the next codepoint instead, if it exists
+        case WILDCARD_STRING -> {
+          // Collapse consecutive '*' ("**" is equivalent to "*"): only append an
+          // any-string automaton when the previous segment isn't already one.
+          if (automata.isEmpty() || Operations.isTotal(automata.getLast()) == false) {
+            automata.add(Automata.makeAnyString());
+          }
+        }
+        case WILDCARD_CHAR -> automata.add(Automata.makeAnyChar());
+        case WILDCARD_ESCAPE -> {
+          // add the escaped codepoint as a literal if it exists; a trailing
+          // '\' is parsed leniently as a literal '\'
           if (i + length < wildcardText.length()) {
             final int nextChar = wildcardText.codePointAt(i + length);
             length += Character.charCount(nextChar);
             automata.add(Automata.makeChar(nextChar));
-            break;
-          } // else fallthru, lenient parsing with a trailing \
-        default:
-          automata.add(Automata.makeChar(c));
+          } else {
+            automata.add(Automata.makeChar(c));
+          }
+        }
+        default -> automata.add(Automata.makeChar(c));
       }
       i += length;
     }
diff --git a/lucene/core/src/test/org/apache/lucene/search/TestWildcardQuery.java b/lucene/core/src/test/org/apache/lucene/search/TestWildcardQuery.java
index c076367ce5b7..d7f81ed71cd2 100644
--- a/lucene/core/src/test/org/apache/lucene/search/TestWildcardQuery.java
+++ b/lucene/core/src/test/org/apache/lucene/search/TestWildcardQuery.java
@@ -38,8 +38,11 @@
 import org.apache.lucene.tests.analysis.MockAnalyzer;
 import org.apache.lucene.tests.index.RandomIndexWriter;
 import org.apache.lucene.tests.util.LuceneTestCase;
+import org.apache.lucene.tests.util.automaton.AutomatonTestUtil;
 import org.apache.lucene.util.BytesRef;
+import org.apache.lucene.util.automaton.Automaton;
 import org.apache.lucene.util.automaton.CompiledAutomaton;
+import org.apache.lucene.util.automaton.Operations;
 
 /** TestWildcardQuery tests the '*' and '?' wildcard characters. */
 public class TestWildcardQuery extends LuceneTestCase {
@@ -235,6 +238,50 @@ public void testEscapes() throws Exception {
     indexStore.close();
   }
 
+  private static Automaton det(Automaton a) {
+    return Operations.determinize(a, Operations.DEFAULT_DETERMINIZE_WORK_LIMIT);
+  }
+
+  public void testRepeatedAsterisksCollapse() {
+    // Consecutive '*' must collapse to a single any-string automaton: same
+    // language as a single '*', and the same (tiny) shape, not a huge one.
+    Automaton single = det(WildcardQuery.toAutomaton(new Term("field", "*")));
+    Automaton repeated = det(WildcardQuery.toAutomaton(new Term("field", "*".repeat(1000))));
+
+    assertTrue(AutomatonTestUtil.sameLanguage(single, repeated));
+    assertEquals(single.getNumStates(), repeated.getNumStates());
+    assertEquals(single.getNumTransitions(), repeated.getNumTransitions());
+  }
+
+  public void testRepeatedAsterisksCollapseWithEscapesAndLiterals() {
+    // Collapsing applies only to unescaped, consecutive '*'. An escaped '\*'
+    // stays a literal and the surrounding literals / '?' are untouched, so
+    // "a\*b***c?" matches the same language as its single-'*' form "a\*b*c?".
+    Automaton collapsed = det(WildcardQuery.toAutomaton(new Term("field", "a\\*b***c?")));
+    Automaton reference = det(WildcardQuery.toAutomaton(new Term("field", "a\\*b*c?")));
+
+    assertTrue(AutomatonTestUtil.sameLanguage(reference, collapsed));
+    assertEquals(reference.getNumStates(), collapsed.getNumStates());
+    assertEquals(reference.getNumTransitions(), collapsed.getNumTransitions());
+
+    // Escaped '\*' is a literal, so "\*\*\*" matches the string "***", not the
+    // any-string '*' — it must NOT be collapsed.
+    Automaton single = det(WildcardQuery.toAutomaton(new Term("field", "*")));
+    Automaton literalStars = det(WildcardQuery.toAutomaton(new Term("field", "\\*\\*\\*")));
+    assertFalse(AutomatonTestUtil.sameLanguage(single, literalStars));
+  }
+
+  public void testInterleavedStarQuestionDoesNotBlowUp() {
+    // '*?' repeated does not collapse (the '*' are not consecutive), but it
+    // must still build a linearly-sized automaton rather than exploding the way
+    // repeated '*' used to before this fix (GITHUB#16134).
+    int n = 5000;
+    Automaton a = WildcardQuery.toAutomaton(new Term("field", "*?".repeat(n)));
+    assertTrue(
+        "expected roughly linear size, got " + a.getNumTransitions() + " transitions for " + n,
+        a.getNumTransitions() < 100L * n);
+  }
+
   private Directory getIndexStore(String field, String[] contents) throws IOException {
     Directory indexStore = newDirectory();
     RandomIndexWriter writer = new RandomIndexWriter(random(), indexStore);