diff --git a/lib/libutil/login.conf.5 b/lib/libutil/login.conf.5
index adb2328dd0bd..c8ebd0261be3 100644
--- a/lib/libutil/login.conf.5
+++ b/lib/libutil/login.conf.5
@@ -74,6 +74,13 @@ All names but the last should be in lower case and contain no blanks;
 the last name may contain upper case characters and blanks for
 readability.
 .Pp
+The 
+.Pa /etc/login.conf 
+file is not referenced directly by 
+.Xr login 1
+so changes will not take effect until 
+.Xr cap_mkdb 1
+is used to compile the file into a database.
 See
 .Xr getcap 3
 for a more in-depth description of the format of a capability database.