diff --git a/evennia/server/portal/telnet.py b/evennia/server/portal/telnet.py
index 4112d85e2a..dd07512b70 100644
--- a/evennia/server/portal/telnet.py
+++ b/evennia/server/portal/telnet.py
@@ -25,7 +25,6 @@ _RE_LINEBREAK = re.compile(r"\n\r|\r\n|\n|\r", re.DOTALL + re.MULTILINE)
 _RE_SCREENREADER_REGEX = re.compile(r"%s" % settings.SCREENREADER_REGEX_STRIP, re.DOTALL + re.MULTILINE)
 _IDLE_COMMAND = settings.IDLE_COMMAND + "\n"
 
-
 class TelnetProtocol(Telnet, StatefulTelnetProtocol, Session):
     """
     Each player connecting over telnet (ie using most traditional mud
@@ -50,6 +49,8 @@ class TelnetProtocol(Telnet, StatefulTelnetProtocol, Session):
         # when it reaches 0 the portal/server syncs their data
         self.handshakes = 8  # suppress-go-ahead, naws, ttype, mccp, mssp, msdp, gmcp, mxp
         self.init_session(self.protocol_name, client_address, self.factory.sessionhandler)
+        # change encoding to ENCODINGS[0] which reflects Telnet default encoding
+        self.protocol_flags["ENCODING"] = settings.ENCODINGS[0] if settings.ENCODINGS else 'utf-8'
 
         # suppress go-ahead
         self.sga = suppress_ga.SuppressGA(self)
diff --git a/evennia/server/session.py b/evennia/server/session.py
index 70be0708d7..96b68662a5 100644
--- a/evennia/server/session.py
+++ b/evennia/server/session.py
@@ -7,7 +7,6 @@ from builtins import object
 
 import time
 
-
 #------------------------------------------------------------
 # Server Session
 #------------------------------------------------------------
diff --git a/evennia/settings_default.py b/evennia/settings_default.py
index fd213d333d..5469fd46db 100644
--- a/evennia/settings_default.py
+++ b/evennia/settings_default.py
@@ -171,6 +171,7 @@ IDLE_COMMAND = "idle"
 # given, this list is tried, in order, aborting on the first match.
 # Add sets for languages/regions your accounts are likely to use.
 # (see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Character_encoding)
+# Telnet default encoding, unless specified by the client, will be ENCODINGS[0].
 ENCODINGS = ["utf-8", "latin-1", "ISO-8859-1"]
 # Regular expression applied to all output to a given session in order
 # to strip away characters (usually various forms of decorations) for the benefit