diff --git a/pkg/storage/engine/db.cc b/pkg/storage/engine/db.cc
index c8148719e814..0206d2d1dc5c 100644
--- a/pkg/storage/engine/db.cc
+++ b/pkg/storage/engine/db.cc
@@ -1533,7 +1533,6 @@ rocksdb::Options DBMakeOptions(DBOptions db_opts) {
   // Enable subcompactions which will use multiple threads to speed up
   // a single compaction. The value of num_cpu/2 has not been tuned.
   options.max_subcompactions = std::max(db_opts.num_cpu / 2, 1);
-  options.use_direct_io_for_flush_and_compaction = db_opts.use_direct_writes;
   options.WAL_ttl_seconds = db_opts.wal_ttl_seconds;
   options.comparator = &kComparator;
   options.create_if_missing = true;
diff --git a/pkg/storage/engine/db.h b/pkg/storage/engine/db.h
index 43440a030327..c26b62b43d3b 100644
--- a/pkg/storage/engine/db.h
+++ b/pkg/storage/engine/db.h
@@ -70,7 +70,6 @@ typedef struct {
   DBCache *cache;
   uint64_t block_size;
   uint64_t wal_ttl_seconds;
-  bool use_direct_writes;
   bool logging_enabled;
   int num_cpu;
   int max_open_files;
diff --git a/pkg/storage/engine/rocksdb.go b/pkg/storage/engine/rocksdb.go
index 5a64b10ec887..a7f410a1ada4 100644
--- a/pkg/storage/engine/rocksdb.go
+++ b/pkg/storage/engine/rocksdb.go
@@ -100,8 +100,6 @@ const (
 	MinimumMaxOpenFiles = 1700
 )
 
-var useDirectWrites = envutil.EnvOrDefaultBool("COCKROACH_USE_DIRECT_WRITES", false)
-
 // SSTableInfo contains metadata about a single RocksDB sstable. This mirrors
 // the C.DBSSTable struct contents.
 type SSTableInfo struct {
@@ -399,13 +397,12 @@ func (r *RocksDB) open() error {
 
 	status := C.DBOpen(&r.rdb, goToCSlice([]byte(r.dir)),
 		C.DBOptions{
-			cache:             r.cache.cache,
-			block_size:        C.uint64_t(blockSize),
-			wal_ttl_seconds:   C.uint64_t(walTTL),
-			use_direct_writes: C.bool(useDirectWrites),
-			logging_enabled:   C.bool(log.V(3)),
-			num_cpu:           C.int(runtime.NumCPU()),
-			max_open_files:    C.int(r.maxOpenFiles),
+			cache:           r.cache.cache,
+			block_size:      C.uint64_t(blockSize),
+			wal_ttl_seconds: C.uint64_t(walTTL),
+			logging_enabled: C.bool(log.V(3)),
+			num_cpu:         C.int(runtime.NumCPU()),
+			max_open_files:  C.int(r.maxOpenFiles),
 		})
 	if err := statusToError(status); err != nil {
 		return errors.Errorf("could not open rocksdb instance: %s", err)