I was linked https://lite.duckduckgo.com/lite, and even without autocomplete or dropdown functionality, it comes in at 8.5 kB, so I'd say that the 10 kB goal is pretty aggressive.

You might be pleased to notice Google Scholar is pretty much still the old design, such a breeze to use

That seems unfair, considering there is no lite google equivalent. The full duckduckgo site still comes in lighter (3/4 of the size), and includes a lot more media, so it's still better than Google.