diff --git a/00DIST b/00DIST
index 9cd9c3b..08918a4 100644
--- a/00DIST
+++ b/00DIST
@@ -5208,5 +5208,13 @@ July 14, 2018
 		The target runs check.bash.
 
 
+		[linux] use close_range instead of calling close repeatedly
+		At the starting up, lsof closes its file descriptors greater
+		than 2 by calling close(2) repeatedly. As reported in #186,
+		it can take long time. Linux 5.9 introduced close_range(2).
+		The new system call can close multiple file descriptors faster.
+		@qianzhangyl reported the original issue (#186).
+
+
 The lsof-org team at GitHub
 November 11, 2020
diff --git a/dialects/linux/dlsof.h b/dialects/linux/dlsof.h
index 16f04e2..721ded4 100644
--- a/dialects/linux/dlsof.h
+++ b/dialects/linux/dlsof.h
@@ -71,6 +71,7 @@
 #include <linux/if_ether.h>
 #include <linux/netlink.h>
 
+#include <sys/syscall.h>
 
 /*
  * This definition is needed for the common function prototype definitions
diff --git a/main.c b/main.c
index e58aa1a..b52956c 100644
--- a/main.c
+++ b/main.c
@@ -127,8 +127,15 @@ main(argc, argv)
 #if	defined(HAS_CLOSEFROM)
 	(void) closefrom(3);
 #else	/* !defined(HAS_CLOSEFROM) */
+#if	defined(SYS_close_range)
+	if (MaxFd > 3 && syscall(SYS_close_range, 3, MaxFd - 1, 0) == 0)
+	    goto closed;
+#endif
 	for (i = 3; i < MaxFd; i++)
 	    (void) close(i);
+#if	defined(SYS_close_range)
+  closed:
+#endif
 #endif	/* !defined(HAS_CLOSEFROM) */
 
 	while (((i = open("/dev/null", O_RDWR, 0)) >= 0) && (i < 2))