diff --git a/lib/Config.js b/lib/Config.js
index 9fe40bf3b6..2fd1483ec9 100644
--- a/lib/Config.js
+++ b/lib/Config.js
@@ -1328,6 +1328,11 @@ class Config extends EventEmitter {
                 this.multiObjectDeleteConcurrency = extractedNumber;
             }
         }
+
+        this.multiObjectDeleteEnableOptimizations = true;
+        if (config.multiObjectDeleteEnableOptimizations === false) {
+            this.multiObjectDeleteEnableOptimizations = false;
+        }
     }
 
     _configureBackends() {
diff --git a/lib/api/multiObjectDelete.js b/lib/api/multiObjectDelete.js
index a9ce79bc04..b7a0be9a52 100644
--- a/lib/api/multiObjectDelete.js
+++ b/lib/api/multiObjectDelete.js
@@ -199,6 +199,9 @@ function decodeObjectVersion(entry) {
  * @return {undefined}
  */
 function initializeMultiObjectDeleteWithBatchingSupport(bucketName, inPlay, log, callback) {
+    if (config.multiObjectDeleteEnableOptimizations === false) {
+        return callback(null, {});
+    }
     // If the backend supports batching, we want to optimize the API latency by
     // first getting all the objects metadata, stored in memory, for later use
     // in the API. This approach does not change the API architecture, but
@@ -340,7 +343,7 @@ function getObjMetadataAndDelete(authInfo, canonicalID, request,
                             options.replayId = objMD.uploadId;
                         }
                         return services.deleteObject(bucketName, objMD,
-                            entry.key, options, true, log, (err, toDelete) => {
+                            entry.key, options, config.multiObjectDeleteEnableOptimizations, log, (err, toDelete) => {
                                 if (err) {
                                     return callback(err);
                                 }