diff --git a/hadoop-yarn-project/CHANGES.txt b/hadoop-yarn-project/CHANGES.txt
index 4ef3301c959..02f61fb3a00 100644
--- a/hadoop-yarn-project/CHANGES.txt
+++ b/hadoop-yarn-project/CHANGES.txt
@@ -157,6 +157,10 @@ Release 2.8.0 - UNRELEASED
     YARN-3593. Add label-type and Improve "DEFAULT_PARTITION" in Node Labels Page. 
     (Naganarasimha G R via wangda)
 
+    YARN-3018. Unified the default value for the configuration property
+    yarn.scheduler.capacity.node-locality-delay in code and default xml file.
+    (Nijel SF via vinodkv)
+
   OPTIMIZATIONS
 
     YARN-3339. TestDockerContainerExecutor should pull a single image and not
diff --git a/hadoop-yarn-project/hadoop-yarn/hadoop-yarn-server/hadoop-yarn-server-resourcemanager/src/main/java/org/apache/hadoop/yarn/server/resourcemanager/scheduler/capacity/CapacitySchedulerConfiguration.java b/hadoop-yarn-project/hadoop-yarn/hadoop-yarn-server/hadoop-yarn-server-resourcemanager/src/main/java/org/apache/hadoop/yarn/server/resourcemanager/scheduler/capacity/CapacitySchedulerConfiguration.java
index 55e360df72c..031ca5d1d73 100644
--- a/hadoop-yarn-project/hadoop-yarn/hadoop-yarn-server/hadoop-yarn-server-resourcemanager/src/main/java/org/apache/hadoop/yarn/server/resourcemanager/scheduler/capacity/CapacitySchedulerConfiguration.java
+++ b/hadoop-yarn-project/hadoop-yarn/hadoop-yarn-server/hadoop-yarn-server-resourcemanager/src/main/java/org/apache/hadoop/yarn/server/resourcemanager/scheduler/capacity/CapacitySchedulerConfiguration.java
@@ -181,7 +181,7 @@ public class CapacitySchedulerConfiguration extends ReservationSchedulerConfigur
      PREFIX + "node-locality-delay";
 
   @Private 
-  public static final int DEFAULT_NODE_LOCALITY_DELAY = -1;
+  public static final int DEFAULT_NODE_LOCALITY_DELAY = 40;
 
   @Private
   public static final String SCHEDULE_ASYNCHRONOUSLY_PREFIX =
@@ -664,8 +664,7 @@ public class CapacitySchedulerConfiguration extends ReservationSchedulerConfigur
   }
 
   public int getNodeLocalityDelay() {
-    int delay = getInt(NODE_LOCALITY_DELAY, DEFAULT_NODE_LOCALITY_DELAY);
-    return (delay == DEFAULT_NODE_LOCALITY_DELAY) ? 0 : delay;
+    return getInt(NODE_LOCALITY_DELAY, DEFAULT_NODE_LOCALITY_DELAY);
   }
   
   public ResourceCalculator getResourceCalculator() {