diff --git a/src/main.cpp b/src/main.cpp
index d62ee1f21..bf01db71b 100644
--- a/src/main.cpp
+++ b/src/main.cpp
@@ -1280,6 +1280,7 @@ static bool recompress_map_database(const GameParams &game_params, const Setting
 	u64 last_update_time = 0;
 	bool &kill = *porting::signal_handler_killstatus();
 	const u8 serialize_as_ver = SER_FMT_VER_HIGHEST_WRITE;
+	const s16 map_compression_level = rangelim(g_settings->getS16("map_compression_level_disk"), -1, 9);
 
 	// This is ok because the server doesn't actually run
 	std::vector<v3s16> blocks;
@@ -1307,7 +1308,7 @@ static bool recompress_map_database(const GameParams &game_params, const Setting
 			oss.str("");
 			oss.clear();
 			writeU8(oss, serialize_as_ver);
-			mb.serialize(oss, serialize_as_ver, true, -1);
+			mb.serialize(oss, serialize_as_ver, true, map_compression_level);
 		}
 
 		db->saveBlock(*it, oss.str());