diff --git a/UPDATING b/UPDATING
index 327bbecd7aa2..990937d547ee 100644
--- a/UPDATING
+++ b/UPDATING
@@ -31,6 +31,15 @@ NOTE TO PEOPLE WHO THINK THAT FreeBSD 12.x IS SLOW:
 	disable the most expensive debugging functionality run
 	"ln -s 'abort:false,junk:false' /etc/malloc.conf".)
 
+20180818:
+	The default interpreter has been switched from 4th to Lua.
+	LOADER_DEFAULT_INTERP, documented in build(7), will override the default
+	interpreter.  If you have custom FORTH code you will need to set
+	LOADER_DEFAULT_INTERP=4th (valid values are 4th, lua or simp) in
+	src.conf for the build.  This will create default hard links between
+	loader and loader_4th instead of loader and loader_lua, the new default.
+	If you are using UEFI it will create the proper hard link to loader.efi.
+
 20180815:
 	ls(1) now respects the COLORTERM environment variable used in other
 	systems and software to indicate that a colored terminal is both
diff --git a/stand/defs.mk b/stand/defs.mk
index e446fd0f6c94..87fb20880462 100644
--- a/stand/defs.mk
+++ b/stand/defs.mk
@@ -154,10 +154,10 @@ CFLAGS+=	-mlittle-endian
 #
 # Have a sensible default
 #
-.if ${MK_FORTH} == "yes"
-LOADER_DEFAULT_INTERP?=4th
-.elif ${MK_LOADER_LUA} == "yes"
+.if ${MK_LOADER_LUA} == "yes"
 LOADER_DEFAULT_INTERP?=lua
+.elif ${MK_FORTH} == "yes"
+LOADER_DEFAULT_INTERP?=4th
 .else
 LOADER_DEFAULT_INTERP?=simp
 .endif