diff --git a/src/mcore_bridge/model/modules/qsa_indexer.py b/src/mcore_bridge/model/modules/qsa_indexer.py
index 85595b2..d8f9b75 100644
--- a/src/mcore_bridge/model/modules/qsa_indexer.py
+++ b/src/mcore_bridge/model/modules/qsa_indexer.py
@@ -111,6 +111,9 @@ def __init__(self, config, tp_group=None):
             dtype=config.params_dtype,
             sequence_parallel=config.sequence_parallel)
         setattr(self.index_qk_proj.weight, 'sequence_parallel', config.sequence_parallel)
+        # QSA selection is non-differentiable and always runs without autograd.
+        # Keep its pretrained parameters out of optimizer groups and DDP buckets.
+        self.requires_grad_(False)
 
     def forward(self, *args, **kwargs):
         raise RuntimeError('QSAIndexer selects via selection_as_mask / selection_as_token_indices / '
diff --git a/tests/test_qwen4_exp_units.py b/tests/test_qwen4_exp_units.py
index 80204d4..7a2bcaa 100644
--- a/tests/test_qwen4_exp_units.py
+++ b/tests/test_qwen4_exp_units.py
@@ -170,6 +170,15 @@ def test_indexer_is_forward_only():
     torch.manual_seed(0)
     cfg = _make_config(compress_ratio=4, budget=64)
     idx = QSAIndexer(cfg).cuda()
+    expected_state_keys = {
+        'index_qk_proj.weight',
+        'q_layernorm.weight',
+        'k_layernorm.weight',
+    }
+    for name, parameter in idx.named_parameters():
+        assert not parameter.requires_grad, f'{name} should be frozen'
+        assert parameter.grad is None, f'{name} unexpectedly got a gradient'
+    assert expected_state_keys.issubset(idx.state_dict())
     with torch.no_grad():
         idx.index_qk_proj.weight.normal_(0, 0.02)
 
@@ -184,14 +193,15 @@ def test_indexer_is_forward_only():
     logits = (q @ q.T).masked_fill(mask[0, 0], float('-inf'))
     logits.softmax(-1).sum().backward()
     backbone_ok = hs.grad is not None and torch.isfinite(hs.grad).all() and hs.grad.abs().sum() > 0
-    indexer_ok = all(p.grad is None for p in idx.parameters())
+    indexer_ok = all(not p.requires_grad and p.grad is None for p in idx.parameters())
 
     print(f'    mask is non-differentiable constant: {mask_is_const} (dtype={mask.dtype})')
     print(f'    backbone received gradient: {backbone_ok}')
-    print(f'    indexer params still have no grad: {indexer_ok}')
+    print(f'    indexer params are frozen and have no grad: {indexer_ok}')
     assert mask_is_const, f'QSA mask must be a non-differentiable bool constant (got {mask.dtype})'
     assert backbone_ok, 'backbone did not receive a finite non-zero gradient through the mask'
-    assert indexer_ok, 'indexer parameters received gradient; the forward-only design no longer holds'
+    assert indexer_ok, ('indexer parameters are trainable or received a gradient; '
+                        'the forward-only design no longer holds')
 
 
 # --------------------------------------------------------------------------