diff --git a/man/pulse-daemon.conf.5.xml.in b/man/pulse-daemon.conf.5.xml.in
index ed7715839..ff5a29362 100644
--- a/man/pulse-daemon.conf.5.xml.in
+++ b/man/pulse-daemon.conf.5.xml.in
@@ -196,7 +196,7 @@ License along with PulseAudio; if not, see <http://www.gnu.org/licenses/>.
 
     <option>
       <p><opt>enable-memfd=</opt>. Enable memfd shared memory. Takes
-      a boolean argument, defaults to <opt>no</opt>.</p>
+      a boolean argument, defaults to <opt>yes</opt>.</p>
     </option>
 
     <option>
diff --git a/src/daemon/daemon-conf.c b/src/daemon/daemon-conf.c
index 427730139..f0ed0b4dc 100644
--- a/src/daemon/daemon-conf.c
+++ b/src/daemon/daemon-conf.c
@@ -92,7 +92,7 @@ static const pa_daemon_conf default_conf = {
 #endif
     .no_cpu_limit = true,
     .disable_shm = false,
-    .disable_memfd = true,
+    .disable_memfd = false,
     .lock_memory = false,
     .deferred_volume = true,
     .default_n_fragments = 4,
diff --git a/src/daemon/daemon.conf.in b/src/daemon/daemon.conf.in
index fcc9cb963..f3a1cc320 100644
--- a/src/daemon/daemon.conf.in
+++ b/src/daemon/daemon.conf.in
@@ -28,6 +28,7 @@ ifelse(@HAVE_DBUS@, 1, [dnl
 ; local-server-type = user
 ])dnl
 ; enable-shm = yes
+; enable-memfd = yes
 ; shm-size-bytes = 0 # setting this 0 will use the system-default, usually 64 MiB
 ; lock-memory = no
 ; cpu-limit = no