diff --git a/crates/commitlog/src/index/indexfile.rs b/crates/commitlog/src/index/indexfile.rs
index 080fac97472..338c3e4552a 100644
--- a/crates/commitlog/src/index/indexfile.rs
+++ b/crates/commitlog/src/index/indexfile.rs
@@ -161,7 +161,7 @@ impl<Key: Into<u64> + From<u64>> IndexFileMut<Key> {
     /// Errors
     /// - `IndexError::InvalidInput`: Either Key or Value is 0
     /// - `IndexError::OutOfMemory`: Append after index file is already full.
-    pub fn append(&mut self, key: Key, value: u64) -> Result<(), IndexError> {
+    pub fn append(&mut self, key: Key, value: u64) -> Result<usize, IndexError> {
         let key = key.into();
         let last_key = self.last_key()?;
         if last_key >= key {
@@ -179,7 +179,7 @@ impl<Key: Into<u64> + From<u64>> IndexFileMut<Key> {
         self.inner[start..start + KEY_SIZE].copy_from_slice(&key_bytes);
         self.inner[start + KEY_SIZE..start + ENTRY_SIZE].copy_from_slice(&value_bytes);
         self.num_entries += 1;
-        Ok(())
+        Ok(start)
     }
 
     /// Asynchronously flushes any pending changes to the index file
@@ -190,6 +190,21 @@ impl<Key: Into<u64> + From<u64>> IndexFileMut<Key> {
         self.inner.flush_async()
     }
 
+    /// Asynchronously flushes the index entry starting at `offset` to the index file.
+    ///
+    /// On linux, the underlying `msync` is a documented no-op since the kernel already
+    /// tracks dirty pages and flushes them as needed.
+    ///
+    /// See https://man7.org/linux/man-pages/man2/msync.2.html for details.
+    ///
+    /// On macOS, it is not a documented no-op, and it explicitly states that `msync`
+    /// will only examine pages covered by the provided address range. Hence this should
+    /// be preferred over [`Self::async_flush`] when only flushing a single entry at a
+    /// time, since it may avoid examining pages across the whole mapping.
+    pub fn async_flush_entry(&self, offset: usize) -> io::Result<()> {
+        self.inner.flush_async_range(offset, ENTRY_SIZE)
+    }
+
     /// Truncates the index file starting from the entry with a key greater than
     /// or equal to the given key.
     ///
diff --git a/crates/commitlog/src/lib.rs b/crates/commitlog/src/lib.rs
index abc8729c978..0f0753f0f36 100644
--- a/crates/commitlog/src/lib.rs
+++ b/crates/commitlog/src/lib.rs
@@ -109,7 +109,7 @@ impl Default for Options {
 impl Options {
     pub const DEFAULT_MAX_SEGMENT_SIZE: u64 = 1024 * 1024 * 1024;
     pub const DEFAULT_OFFSET_INDEX_INTERVAL_BYTES: NonZeroU64 = NonZeroU64::new(4096).expect("4096 > 0, qed");
-    pub const DEFAULT_OFFSET_INDEX_REQUIRE_SEGMENT_FSYNC: bool = false;
+    pub const DEFAULT_OFFSET_INDEX_REQUIRE_SEGMENT_FSYNC: bool = true;
     pub const DEFAULT_PREALLOCATE_SEGMENTS: bool = false;
     pub const DEFAULT_WRITE_BUFFER_SIZE: usize = 8 * 1024;
 
diff --git a/crates/commitlog/src/segment.rs b/crates/commitlog/src/segment.rs
index 7913a3799e5..d4f85bf8fa0 100644
--- a/crates/commitlog/src/segment.rs
+++ b/crates/commitlog/src/segment.rs
@@ -356,9 +356,10 @@ impl OffsetIndexWriter {
             return Ok(());
         }
 
-        self.head
+        let entry_offset = self
+            .head
             .append(self.candidate_min_tx_offset, self.candidate_byte_offset)?;
-        self.head.async_flush()?;
+        self.head.async_flush_entry(entry_offset)?;
         self.reset();
 
         Ok(())
@@ -371,10 +372,6 @@ impl FileLike for OffsetIndexWriter {
         let _ = self.append_internal().map_err(|e| {
             warn!("failed to append to offset index: {e:?}");
         });
-        let _ = self
-            .head
-            .async_flush()
-            .map_err(|e| warn!("failed to flush offset index: {e:?}"));
         Ok(())
     }