diff --git a/src/libstore/globals.hh b/src/libstore/globals.hh
index be922c9f7..ff3df46ba 100644
--- a/src/libstore/globals.hh
+++ b/src/libstore/globals.hh
@@ -1227,14 +1227,13 @@ public:
 
     Setting<uint64_t> warnLargePathThreshold{
         this,
-        // n.b. this is deliberately int64 max rather than uint64 max because
-        // this goes through the Nix language JSON parser and thus needs to be
-        // representable in Nix language integers.
-        std::numeric_limits<int64_t>::max(),
+        0,
         "warn-large-path-threshold",
         R"(
           Warn when copying a path larger than this number of bytes to the Nix store
           (as determined by its NAR serialisation).
+          Default is 0, which disables the warning.
+          Set it to 1 to warn on all paths.
         )"
     };
 };
diff --git a/src/libstore/store-api.cc b/src/libstore/store-api.cc
index 8109ea322..10577fa2a 100644
--- a/src/libstore/store-api.cc
+++ b/src/libstore/store-api.cc
@@ -171,7 +171,7 @@ std::pair<StorePath, Hash> StoreDirConfig::computeStorePath(
     PathFilter & filter) const
 {
     auto [h, size] = hashPath(path, method.getFileIngestionMethod(), hashAlgo, filter);
-    if (size && *size >= settings.warnLargePathThreshold)
+    if (settings.warnLargePathThreshold && size && *size >= settings.warnLargePathThreshold)
         warn("hashed large path '%s' (%s)", path, renderSize(*size));
     return {
         makeFixedOutputPathFromCA(
@@ -214,7 +214,7 @@ StorePath Store::addToStore(
     auto sink = sourceToSink([&](Source & source) {
         LengthSource lengthSource(source);
         storePath = addToStoreFromDump(lengthSource, name, fsm, method, hashAlgo, references, repair);
-        if (lengthSource.total >= settings.warnLargePathThreshold)
+        if (settings.warnLargePathThreshold && lengthSource.total >= settings.warnLargePathThreshold)
             warn("copied large path '%s' to the store (%s)", path, renderSize(lengthSource.total));
     });
     dumpPath(path, *sink, fsm, filter);