diff --git a/mercurial/configitems.py b/mercurial/configitems.py
--- a/mercurial/configitems.py
+++ b/mercurial/configitems.py
@@ -110,6 +110,9 @@ coreconfigitem('format', 'aggressivemerg
 coreconfigitem('format', 'chunkcachesize',
     default=None,
 )
+coreconfigitem('format', 'dotencode',
+    default=True,
+)
 coreconfigitem('hostsecurity', 'ciphers',
     default=None,
 )
diff --git a/mercurial/localrepo.py b/mercurial/localrepo.py
--- a/mercurial/localrepo.py
+++ b/mercurial/localrepo.py
@@ -2078,7 +2078,7 @@ def newreporequirements(repo):
         requirements.add('store')
         if ui.configbool('format', 'usefncache', True):
             requirements.add('fncache')
-            if ui.configbool('format', 'dotencode', True):
+            if ui.configbool('format', 'dotencode'):
                 requirements.add('dotencode')
 
     compengine = ui.config('experimental', 'format.compression', 'zlib')