diff --git a/fs/overlayfs/dir.c b/fs/overlayfs/dir.c
index 6515796460df..bfabc65fdc74 100644
--- a/fs/overlayfs/dir.c
+++ b/fs/overlayfs/dir.c
@@ -210,7 +210,7 @@ static int ovl_create_upper(struct dentry *dentry, struct inode *inode,
 	if (err)
 		goto out_dput;
 
-	if (ovl_type_merge(dentry->d_parent)) {
+	if (ovl_type_merge(dentry->d_parent) && d_is_dir(newdentry)) {
 		/* Setting opaque here is just an optimization, allow to fail */
 		ovl_set_opaque(dentry, newdentry);
 	}