diff --git a/fs/btrfs/compression.c b/fs/btrfs/compression.c
index 3896bd0175ecaa27ec961d95c44ce3dea0426aa2..883ecc58fd0dabeda45dd05557c503bd47a71902 100644
--- a/fs/btrfs/compression.c
+++ b/fs/btrfs/compression.c
@@ -1047,3 +1047,36 @@ int btrfs_decompress_buf2page(const char *buf, unsigned long buf_start,
 
 	return 1;
 }
+
+/*
+ * Compression heuristic.
+ *
+ * For now is's a naive and optimistic 'return true', we'll extend the logic to
+ * quickly (compared to direct compression) detect data characteristics
+ * (compressible/uncompressible) to avoid wasting CPU time on uncompressible
+ * data.
+ *
+ * The following types of analysis can be performed:
+ * - detect mostly zero data
+ * - detect data with low "byte set" size (text, etc)
+ * - detect data with low/high "core byte" set
+ *
+ * Return non-zero if the compression should be done, 0 otherwise.
+ */
+int btrfs_compress_heuristic(struct inode *inode, u64 start, u64 end)
+{
+	u64 index = start >> PAGE_SHIFT;
+	u64 end_index = end >> PAGE_SHIFT;
+	struct page *page;
+	int ret = 1;
+
+	while (index <= end_index) {
+		page = find_get_page(inode->i_mapping, index);
+		kmap(page);
+		kunmap(page);
+		put_page(page);
+		index++;
+	}
+
+	return ret;
+}
diff --git a/fs/btrfs/compression.h b/fs/btrfs/compression.h
index 87f6d3332163e2949465a9b85f8c7c73d963e584..8508ba6b9aef6deead0c534a3dced743fa69b8df 100644
--- a/fs/btrfs/compression.h
+++ b/fs/btrfs/compression.h
@@ -129,4 +129,6 @@ struct btrfs_compress_op {
 extern const struct btrfs_compress_op btrfs_zlib_compress;
 extern const struct btrfs_compress_op btrfs_lzo_compress;
 
+int btrfs_compress_heuristic(struct inode *inode, u64 start, u64 end);
+
 #endif
diff --git a/fs/btrfs/inode.c b/fs/btrfs/inode.c
index 467b9477dac4d9cc34bdd4094cf5447aeaa9f775..0bd008b9e0d162325fea7434ceca51ec9893791d 100644
--- a/fs/btrfs/inode.c
+++ b/fs/btrfs/inode.c
@@ -392,7 +392,7 @@ static noinline int add_async_extent(struct async_cow *cow,
 	return 0;
 }
 
-static inline int inode_need_compress(struct inode *inode)
+static inline int inode_need_compress(struct inode *inode, u64 start, u64 end)
 {
 	struct btrfs_fs_info *fs_info = btrfs_sb(inode->i_sb);
 
@@ -405,7 +405,7 @@ static inline int inode_need_compress(struct inode *inode)
 	if (btrfs_test_opt(fs_info, COMPRESS) ||
 	    BTRFS_I(inode)->flags & BTRFS_INODE_COMPRESS ||
 	    BTRFS_I(inode)->force_compress)
-		return 1;
+		return btrfs_compress_heuristic(inode, start, end);
 	return 0;
 }
 
@@ -503,7 +503,7 @@ static noinline void compress_file_range(struct inode *inode,
 	 * inode has not been flagged as nocompress.  This flag can
 	 * change at any time if we discover bad compression ratios.
 	 */
-	if (inode_need_compress(inode)) {
+	if (inode_need_compress(inode, start, end)) {
 		WARN_ON(pages);
 		pages = kcalloc(nr_pages, sizeof(struct page *), GFP_NOFS);
 		if (!pages) {
@@ -1576,7 +1576,7 @@ static int run_delalloc_range(void *private_data, struct page *locked_page,
 	} else if (BTRFS_I(inode)->flags & BTRFS_INODE_PREALLOC && !force_cow) {
 		ret = run_delalloc_nocow(inode, locked_page, start, end,
 					 page_started, 0, nr_written);
-	} else if (!inode_need_compress(inode)) {
+	} else if (!inode_need_compress(inode, start, end)) {
 		ret = cow_file_range(inode, locked_page, start, end, end,
 				      page_started, nr_written, 1, NULL);
 	} else {