diff --git a/doc/man/man8/slurmctld.8 b/doc/man/man8/slurmctld.8
index 7cd1e5b76bb416ab7de0bc1ce5b0a614106cae40..f9c761a2ade3fe4ac959564ad18a6c4259378bef 100644
--- a/doc/man/man8/slurmctld.8
+++ b/doc/man/man8/slurmctld.8
@@ -30,7 +30,7 @@ jobs will be killed.
 
 .TP
 \fB\-D\fR
-Debug mode. Execute \fBslurmctld\fR in the foreground with logging to stdout.
+Run \fBslurmctld\fR in the foreground with logging copied to stdout.
 .TP
 \fB\-f <file>\fR
 Read configuration from the specified file. See \fBNOTES\fR below.
diff --git a/doc/man/man8/slurmdbd.8 b/doc/man/man8/slurmdbd.8
index d2c7e36b8560f5d5a62759b8035ea4cf6a57dbaa..124dc998bd2386982f893f9175cbd1ceb0db9862 100644
--- a/doc/man/man8/slurmdbd.8
+++ b/doc/man/man8/slurmdbd.8
@@ -13,7 +13,7 @@ for Slurm. This is particularly useful for archiving accounting records.
 OPTIONS
 .TP
 \fB\-D\fR
-Debug mode. Execute \fBslurmdbd\fR in the foreground with logging to stdout.
+Run \fBslurmdbd\fR in the foreground with logging copied to stdout.
 .TP
 \fB\-h\fR
 Help; print a brief summary of command options.