When zooming out on more than 500-600 shapes and then panning, if telerik:DiagramSurface.IsVirtualizing="True", the performance is slower. When virtualization is off, the performance is a little better.
Loading a DataTemplate containing a RadDiagram with custom GraphSource and Two-Way MVVM starts to become very slow at about >60 Shapes as well (Version 2018.3.1016.45 NoXAML). The delay here is >5 seconds before the Template is shown. Direct placement of custom shapes via inheritance of RadDiagramShapeBase is faster (measured ~1,5 seconds with 150 shapes), but not a sound option in a MVVM Application.