diff --git a/docs/CODING_STYLE.md b/docs/CODING_STYLE.md
index 851676bc2b..c15dc1abf7 100644
--- a/docs/CODING_STYLE.md
+++ b/docs/CODING_STYLE.md
@@ -587,6 +587,12 @@ layout: default
   time you need that please immediately undefine `basename()`, and add a
   comment about it, so that no code ever ends up using the POSIX version!
 
+- Never use FILENAME_MAX. Use PATH_MAX instead (for checking maximum size of
+  paths) and NAME_MAX (for checking maximum size of filenames). FILENAME_MAX is
+  not POSIX, and is a confusingly named alias for PATH_MAX on Linux. Note the
+  NAME_MAX does not include space for a trailing NUL, but PATH_MAX does. UNIX
+  FTW!
+
 ## Committing to git
 
 - Commit message subject lines should be prefixed with an appropriate component
diff --git a/docs/USER_NAMES.md b/docs/USER_NAMES.md
index ec07b19f30..daafdf2dce 100644
--- a/docs/USER_NAMES.md
+++ b/docs/USER_NAMES.md
@@ -87,8 +87,8 @@ hyphen. A size limit is enforced: the minimum of `sysconf(_SC_LOGIN_NAME_MAX)`
 (typically 256 on Linux; rationale: this is how POSIX suggests to detect the
 limit), `UT_NAMESIZE-1` (typically 31 on Linux; rationale: names longer than
 this cannot correctly appear in `utmp`/`wtmp` and create ambiguity with login
-accounting) and `FILENAME_MAX` (4096 on Linux; rationale: user names typically
-appear in directory names, i.e. the home directory), thus MIN(256, 31, 4096) =
+accounting) and `NAME_MAX` (255 on Linux; rationale: user names typically
+appear in directory names, i.e. the home directory), thus MIN(256, 31, 255) =
 31.
 
 Note that these rules are both more strict and more relaxed than all of the
diff --git a/src/basic/cgroup-util.c b/src/basic/cgroup-util.c
index 0ecb8d944e..7372b06024 100644
--- a/src/basic/cgroup-util.c
+++ b/src/basic/cgroup-util.c
@@ -1567,7 +1567,7 @@ bool cg_controller_is_valid(const char *p) {
                 if (!strchr(CONTROLLER_VALID, *t))
                         return false;
 
-        if (t - p > FILENAME_MAX)
+        if (t - p > NAME_MAX)
                 return false;
 
         return true;
diff --git a/src/basic/fs-util.c b/src/basic/fs-util.c
index 539b0a4886..cc219d297b 100644
--- a/src/basic/fs-util.c
+++ b/src/basic/fs-util.c
@@ -135,34 +135,34 @@ int rename_noreplace(int olddirfd, const char *oldpath, int newdirfd, const char
 }
 
 int readlinkat_malloc(int fd, const char *p, char **ret) {
-        size_t l = FILENAME_MAX+1;
-        int r;
+        size_t l = PATH_MAX;
 
         assert(p);
         assert(ret);
 
         for (;;) {
-                char *c;
+                _cleanup_free_ char *c = NULL;
                 ssize_t n;
 
-                c = new(char, l);
+                c = new(char, l+1);
                 if (!c)
                         return -ENOMEM;
 
-                n = readlinkat(fd, p, c, l-1);
-                if (n < 0) {
-                        r = -errno;
-                        free(c);
-                        return r;
-                }
+                n = readlinkat(fd, p, c, l);
+                if (n < 0)
+                        return -errno;
 
-                if ((size_t) n < l-1) {
+                if ((size_t) n < l) {
                         c[n] = 0;
-                        *ret = c;
+                        *ret = TAKE_PTR(c);
                         return 0;
                 }
 
-                free(c);
+                if (l > (SSIZE_MAX-1)/2) /* readlinkat() returns an ssize_t, and we want an extra byte for a
+                                          * trailing NUL, hence do an overflow check relative to SSIZE_MAX-1
+                                          * here */
+                        return -EFBIG;
+
                 l *= 2;
         }
 }
diff --git a/src/basic/mountpoint-util.c b/src/basic/mountpoint-util.c
index ed7457f8b7..adf10a4548 100644
--- a/src/basic/mountpoint-util.c
+++ b/src/basic/mountpoint-util.c
@@ -148,7 +148,7 @@ static bool filename_possibly_with_slash_suffix(const char *s) {
         if (!slash)
                 return filename_is_valid(s);
 
-        if (slash - s > FILENAME_MAX) /* We want to allocate on the stack below, hence do a size check first */
+        if (slash - s > PATH_MAX) /* We want to allocate on the stack below, hence do a size check first */
                 return false;
 
         if (slash[strspn(slash, "/")] != 0) /* Check that the suffix consist only of one or more slashes */
diff --git a/src/basic/user-util.c b/src/basic/user-util.c
index 1fad342cef..0ea4e409fa 100644
--- a/src/basic/user-util.c
+++ b/src/basic/user-util.c
@@ -836,7 +836,7 @@ bool valid_user_group_name(const char *u, ValidUserFlags flags) {
 
                 if (l > (size_t) sz)
                         return false;
-                if (l > FILENAME_MAX)
+                if (l > NAME_MAX) /* must fit in a filename */
                         return false;
                 if (l > UT_NAMESIZE - 1)
                         return false;
diff --git a/src/shared/efi-loader.c b/src/shared/efi-loader.c
index 2aab39c32d..ee32b0b097 100644
--- a/src/shared/efi-loader.c
+++ b/src/shared/efi-loader.c
@@ -809,10 +809,8 @@ bool efi_has_tpm2(void) {
 #endif
 
 bool efi_loader_entry_name_valid(const char *s) {
-        if (isempty(s))
-                return false;
 
-        if (strlen(s) > FILENAME_MAX) /* Make sure entry names fit in filenames */
+        if (!filename_is_valid(s)) /* Make sure entry names fit in filenames */
                 return false;
 
         return in_charset(s, ALPHANUMERICAL "+-_.");
diff --git a/src/test/test-path-util.c b/src/test/test-path-util.c
index b92a77b9f4..b49b0ae908 100644
--- a/src/test/test-path-util.c
+++ b/src/test/test-path-util.c
@@ -838,6 +838,15 @@ static void test_path_startswith_strv(void) {
 int main(int argc, char **argv) {
         test_setup_logging(LOG_DEBUG);
 
+        log_info("PATH_MAX=%zu\n"
+                 "FILENAME_MAX=%zu\n"
+                 "NAME_MAX=%zu",
+                 (size_t) PATH_MAX,
+                 (size_t) FILENAME_MAX,
+                 (size_t) NAME_MAX);
+
+        assert_cc(FILENAME_MAX == PATH_MAX);
+
         test_print_paths();
         test_path();
         test_path_equal_root();