diff --git a/hbase-server/src/main/java/org/apache/hadoop/hbase/regionserver/MemStoreCompactor.java b/hbase-server/src/main/java/org/apache/hadoop/hbase/regionserver/MemStoreCompactor.java
index 0d3f47e2ad3..08af7fe88b6 100644
--- a/hbase-server/src/main/java/org/apache/hadoop/hbase/regionserver/MemStoreCompactor.java
+++ b/hbase-server/src/main/java/org/apache/hadoop/hbase/regionserver/MemStoreCompactor.java
@@ -50,7 +50,7 @@ public class MemStoreCompactor {
   public static final String COMPACTING_MEMSTORE_THRESHOLD_KEY =
       "hbase.hregion.compacting.pipeline.segments.limit";
   // remaining with the same ("infinity") but configurable default for now
-  public static final int COMPACTING_MEMSTORE_THRESHOLD_DEFAULT = 30;
+  public static final int COMPACTING_MEMSTORE_THRESHOLD_DEFAULT = 1;
 
   public static final long DEEP_OVERHEAD = ClassSize
       .align(ClassSize.OBJECT