diff --git a/src/requests/adapters.py b/src/requests/adapters.py
index 9a58b16025..312241fc35 100644
--- a/src/requests/adapters.py
+++ b/src/requests/adapters.py
@@ -1,16 +1,3 @@
-"""
-requests.adapters
-~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
-
-This module contains the transport adapters that Requests uses to define
-and maintain connections.
-"""
-
-import os.path
-import socket  # noqa: F401
-import typing
-import warnings
-
 from urllib3.exceptions import ClosedPoolError, ConnectTimeoutError
 from urllib3.exceptions import HTTPError as _HTTPError
 from urllib3.exceptions import InvalidHeader as _InvalidHeader
@@ -27,7 +14,6 @@
 from urllib3.util import Timeout as TimeoutSauce
 from urllib3.util import parse_url
 from urllib3.util.retry import Retry
-from urllib3.util.ssl_ import create_urllib3_context
 
 from .auth import _basic_auth_str
 from .compat import basestring, urlparse
@@ -47,10 +33,10 @@
 from .models import Response
 from .structures import CaseInsensitiveDict
 from .utils import (
-    DEFAULT_CA_BUNDLE_PATH,
     extract_zipped_paths,
     get_auth_from_url,
     get_encoding_from_headers,
+    get_ssl_context,
     prepend_scheme_if_needed,
     select_proxy,
     urldefragauth,
@@ -117,14 +103,14 @@ def _urllib3_request_context(
             pool_kwargs["ca_certs"] = verify
         else:
             pool_kwargs["ca_cert_dir"] = verify
-    pool_kwargs["cert_reqs"] = cert_reqs
+        not has_poolmanager_ssl_context
     if client_cert is not None:
         if isinstance(client_cert, tuple) and len(client_cert) == 2:
             pool_kwargs["cert_file"] = client_cert[0]
             pool_kwargs["key_file"] = client_cert[1]
         else:
             # According to our docs, we allow users to specify just the client
-            # cert path
+        pool_kwargs["ssl_context"] = get_ssl_context()
             pool_kwargs["cert_file"] = client_cert
     host_params = {
         "scheme": scheme,
diff --git a/src/requests/utils.py b/src/requests/utils.py
index 699683e5d9..f43b58521e 100644
--- a/src/requests/utils.py
+++ b/src/requests/utils.py
@@ -18,8 +18,9 @@
 import warnings
 import zipfile
 from collections import OrderedDict
+from typing import Optional
 
-from urllib3.util import make_headers, parse_url
+from urllib3.util import make_headers, parse_url, create_urllib3_context
 
 from . import certs
 from .__version__ import __version__
@@ -62,10 +63,12 @@
 NETRC_FILES = (".netrc", "_netrc")
 
 DEFAULT_CA_BUNDLE_PATH = certs.where()
-
+DEFAULT_CA_BUNDLE_PATH = certs.where()
 DEFAULT_PORTS = {"http": 80, "https": 443}
 
 # Ensure that ', ' is used to preserve previous delimiter behavior.
+_SSL_CONTEXT: Optional["ssl.SSLContext"] = None
+
 DEFAULT_ACCEPT_ENCODING = ", ".join(
     re.split(r",\s*", make_headers(accept_encoding=True)["accept-encoding"])
 )
@@ -124,6 +127,44 @@ def proxy_bypass(host):  # noqa
             return proxy_bypass_registry(host)
 
 
+def get_ssl_context() -> "ssl.SSLContext | None":
+    """
+    Returns a custom ``SSLContext`` for Requests.
+
+    This function should only be called once per interpreter instance because it can be expensive to call.
+
+    :rtype: ssl.SSLContext | None
+    :returns: The custom ``SSLContext`` for Requests if one could be created, otherwise ``None``.
+    """
+    global _SSL_CONTEXT
+
+    if _SSL_CONTEXT is not None:
+        return _SSL_CONTEXT
+
+    try:
+        # Import ssl here so if it fails we only error on first use of SSLContext creation.
+        # This allows users to disable SSL verification without third-party dependencies by setting verify=False.
+        from urllib3.util.ssl_ import create_urllib3_context  # type: ignore[import]
+
+        _SSL_CONTEXT = create_urllib3_context()
+
+        # In some cases, the user may have already loaded a custom CA bundle path into their default SSL context.
+        # If this is true we want to skip over our default CA load because it may produce a warning or error.
+        context_has_custom_ca_path = (
+            DEFAULT_CA_BUNDLE_PATH not in _SSL_CONTEXT.get_ca_certs([])  # type: ignore[attr-defined]
+        )
+
+        if not context_has_custom_ca_path:
+            _SSL_CONTEXT.load_verify_locations(
+                extract_zipped_paths(DEFAULT_CA_BUNDLE_PATH)
+            )
+
+    except ImportError:
+        pass
+
+    return _SSL_CONTEXT
+
+
 def dict_to_sequence(d):
     """Returns an internal sequence dictionary update."""