diff --git a/HISTORY.md b/HISTORY.md
index 0a976033e..db9ae89ce 100644
--- a/HISTORY.md
+++ b/HISTORY.md
@@ -10,6 +10,7 @@
 
 ### Public API changes
 * Removed Customizable support for RateLimiter and removed its CreateFromString() and Type() functions.
+* `CompactRangeOptions::exclusive_manual_compaction` is now false by default. This ensures RocksDB does not introduce artificial parallelism limitations by default.
 
 ### Bug Fixes
 * Fix a bug where `GenericRateLimiter` could revert the bandwidth set dynamically using `SetBytesPerSecond()` when a user configures a structure enclosing it, e.g., using `GetOptionsFromString()` to configure an `Options` that references an existing `RateLimiter` object.
diff --git a/db/db_compaction_test.cc b/db/db_compaction_test.cc
index 57155f441..d4b96c757 100644
--- a/db/db_compaction_test.cc
+++ b/db/db_compaction_test.cc
@@ -2660,8 +2660,9 @@ TEST_F(DBCompactionTest, ManualAutoRace) {
   TEST_SYNC_POINT("DBCompactionTest::ManualAutoRace:1");
   // The auto compaction will wait until the manual compaction is registerd
   // before processing so that it will be cancelled.
-  ASSERT_OK(dbfull()->CompactRange(CompactRangeOptions(), handles_[1], nullptr,
-                                   nullptr));
+  CompactRangeOptions cro;
+  cro.exclusive_manual_compaction = true;
+  ASSERT_OK(dbfull()->CompactRange(cro, handles_[1], nullptr, nullptr));
   ASSERT_EQ("0,1", FilesPerLevel(1));
 
   // Eventually the cancelled compaction will be rescheduled and executed.
diff --git a/db/db_impl/db_impl_compaction_flush.cc b/db/db_impl/db_impl_compaction_flush.cc
index 23abb5a34..7e517947b 100644
--- a/db/db_impl/db_impl_compaction_flush.cc
+++ b/db/db_impl/db_impl_compaction_flush.cc
@@ -1853,8 +1853,7 @@ Status DBImpl::RunManualCompaction(
   // jobs drops to zero. This used to be needed to ensure that this manual
   // compaction can compact any range of keys/files. Now it is optional
   // (see `CompactRangeOptions::exclusive_manual_compaction`). The use case for
-  // `exclusive_manual_compaction=true` (the default) is unclear beyond not
-  // trusting the new code.
+  // `exclusive_manual_compaction=true` is unclear beyond not trusting the code.
   //
   // HasPendingManualCompaction() is true when at least one thread is inside
   // RunManualCompaction(), i.e. during that time no other compaction will
diff --git a/include/rocksdb/options.h b/include/rocksdb/options.h
index 7a58c1c09..917379e05 100644
--- a/include/rocksdb/options.h
+++ b/include/rocksdb/options.h
@@ -1843,8 +1843,11 @@ enum class BlobGarbageCollectionPolicy {
 // CompactRangeOptions is used by CompactRange() call.
 struct CompactRangeOptions {
   // If true, no other compaction will run at the same time as this
-  // manual compaction
-  bool exclusive_manual_compaction = true;
+  // manual compaction.
+  //
+  // Default: false
+  bool exclusive_manual_compaction = false;
+
   // If true, compacted files will be moved to the minimum level capable
   // of holding the data or given level (specified non-negative target_level).
   bool change_level = false;