diff --git a/meta/conf/bitbake.conf b/meta/conf/bitbake.conf
index 4cfa8b10b58b..2ecba508935c 100644
--- a/meta/conf/bitbake.conf
+++ b/meta/conf/bitbake.conf
@@ -161,7 +161,7 @@ ZSTD_THREADS ?= "${@oe.utils.cpu_count(at_least=2)}"
 ZSTD_THREADS[vardepvalue] = "1"
 ZSTD_LEVEL ?= "19"
 ZSTD_DEFAULTS ?= "--rsyncable -${ZSTD_LEVEL} --threads=${ZSTD_THREADS}"
-ZSTD_DEFAULTS[vardepsexclude] += "ZSTD_LEVEL ZSTD_THREADS"
+ZSTD_DEFAULTS[vardepsexclude] += "ZSTD_THREADS"
 
 # Default compression settings for zchunk
 ZCK_DEFAULTS ?= ""