diff --git a/util/check-format.pl b/util/check-format.pl
index 04dde14c9d..c2277013ef 100755
--- a/util/check-format.pl
+++ b/util/check-format.pl
@@ -12,7 +12,7 @@
 # - check formatting of C source according to OpenSSL coding style
 #
 # usage:
-#   check-format.pl [-l|--sloppy-len] [-l|--sloppy-bodylen]
+#   check-format.pl [-l|--strict-len] [-b|--sloppy-bodylen]
 #                   [-s|--sloppy-space] [-c|--sloppy-comment]
 #                   [-m|--sloppy-macro] [-h|--sloppy-hang]
 #                   [-e|--eol-comment] [-1|--1-stmt]
@@ -28,8 +28,8 @@
 # Still it should be useful for detecting most typical glitches.
 #
 # options:
-#  -l | --sloppy-len     increase accepted max line length from 80 to 84
-#  -l | --sloppy-bodylen do not report function body length > 200
+#  -l | --strict-len     decrease accepted max line length from 100 to 80
+#  -b | --sloppy-bodylen do not report function body length > 200
 #  -s | --sloppy-space   do not report whitespace nits
 #  -c | --sloppy-comment do not report indentation of comments
 #                        Otherwise for each multi-line comment the indentation of
@@ -93,7 +93,8 @@ use strict;
 use POSIX;
 
 use constant INDENT_LEVEL => 4;
-use constant MAX_LINE_LENGTH => 80;
+use constant MAX_LINE_LENGTH => 100;
+use constant STRICT_LINE_LENGTH => 80;
 use constant MAX_BODY_LENGTH => 200;
 
 # global variables @@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@
@@ -110,8 +111,8 @@ my $extended_1_stmt = 0;
 
 while ($ARGV[0] =~ m/^-(\w|-[\w\-]+)$/) {
     my $arg = $1; shift;
-    if ($arg =~ m/^(l|-sloppy-len)$/) {
-        $max_length += INDENT_LEVEL;
+    if ($arg =~ m/^(l|-strict-len)$/) {
+        $max_length = STRICT_LINE_LENGTH;
     } elsif ($arg =~ m/^(b|-sloppy-bodylen)$/) {
         $sloppy_bodylen = 1;
     } elsif ($arg =~ m/^(s|-sloppy-space)$/) {
@@ -425,7 +426,7 @@ sub check_indent { # used for lines outside multi-line string literals
         # do not report if contents have been shifted left of nested expr indent (but not as far as stmt indent)
         # apparently aligned to the right in order to fit within line length limit
         return if $stmt_indent < $count && $count < $expr_indent &&
-            length($contents) == MAX_LINE_LENGTH + length("\n");
+            length($contents) == $max_length + length("\n");
     }
 
     report("indent = $count != $ref_indent for $ref_desc".
@@ -677,7 +678,7 @@ while (<>) { # loop over all lines of all input files
           && length($1) < $max_length)
         # this allows over-long trailing string literals with beginning col before $max_length
         ) {
-        report("line length = $len > ".MAX_LINE_LENGTH);
+        report("line length = $len > ".$max_length);
     }
 
     # handle C++ / C99 - style end-of-line comments