diff --git a/config.example.toml b/config.example.toml
index 67916049e4a..bf22895c324 100644
--- a/config.example.toml
+++ b/config.example.toml
@@ -808,4 +808,4 @@ changelog-seen = 2
 # compression profile, the longer compression will take.
 #
 # Available options: fast, balanced, best
-#compression-profile = "balanced"
+#compression-profile = "fast"
diff --git a/src/bootstrap/config.rs b/src/bootstrap/config.rs
index 939853a76d8..66f7a014149 100644
--- a/src/bootstrap/config.rs
+++ b/src/bootstrap/config.rs
@@ -821,7 +821,7 @@ impl Config {
         config.deny_warnings = true;
         config.bindir = "bin".into();
         config.dist_include_mingw_linker = true;
-        config.dist_compression_profile = "balanced".into();
+        config.dist_compression_profile = "fast".into();
 
         // set by build.rs
         config.build = TargetSelection::from_user(&env!("BUILD_TRIPLE"));
diff --git a/src/bootstrap/defaults/config.user.toml b/src/bootstrap/defaults/config.user.toml
index 48ae2fe448d..ee271c3fb51 100644
--- a/src/bootstrap/defaults/config.user.toml
+++ b/src/bootstrap/defaults/config.user.toml
@@ -11,3 +11,7 @@ extended = true
 [llvm]
 # Most users installing from source want to build all parts of the project from source, not just rustc itself.
 download-ci-llvm = false
+
+[dist]
+# Use better compression when preparing tarballs.
+compression-profile = "balanced"