diff --git a/configure.ac b/configure.ac
index 49cc383b..a30db42a 100644
--- a/configure.ac
+++ b/configure.ac
@@ -1870,7 +1870,7 @@ AC_DEFINE_UNQUOTED(SCDAEMON_SOCK_NAME, "S.scdaemon",
 AC_DEFINE_UNQUOTED(DIRMNGR_SOCK_NAME, "S.dirmngr",
                    [The name of the dirmngr socket])
 AC_DEFINE_UNQUOTED(DIRMNGR_DEFAULT_KEYSERVER,
-                   "hkps://hkps.pool.sks-keyservers.net",
+                   "hkps://keys.openpgp.org",
       [The default keyserver for dirmngr to use, if none is explicitly given])
 
 AC_DEFINE_UNQUOTED(GPGEXT_GPG, "gpg", [The standard binary file suffix])
diff --git a/doc/dirmngr.texi b/doc/dirmngr.texi
index 3c5c47b0..99ae817e 100644
--- a/doc/dirmngr.texi
+++ b/doc/dirmngr.texi
@@ -329,7 +329,11 @@ whether Tor is locally running or not.  The check for a running Tor is
 done for each new connection.
 
 If no keyserver is explicitly configured, dirmngr will use the
-built-in default of hkps://hkps.pool.sks-keyservers.net.
+built-in default of hkps://keys.openpgp.org.
+
+Note that the above default is a Debian-specific choice.  Upstream
+GnuPG prefers hkps://hkps.pool.sks-keyservers.net.  See
+/usr/share/doc/gpgconf/NEWS.Debian.gz for more details.
 
 @item --nameserver @var{ipaddr}
 @opindex nameserver