diff --git a/src/busctl/busctl.c b/src/busctl/busctl.c
index 6188216d28..0bcc89f6f2 100644
--- a/src/busctl/busctl.c
+++ b/src/busctl/busctl.c
@@ -1939,7 +1939,7 @@ static void json_dump_with_flags(JsonVariant *v, FILE *f) {
 
         json_variant_dump(v,
                           (arg_json == JSON_PRETTY ? JSON_FORMAT_PRETTY : JSON_FORMAT_NEWLINE) |
-                          colors_enabled() * JSON_FORMAT_COLOR,
+                          JSON_FORMAT_COLOR_AUTO,
                           f, NULL);
 }
 
diff --git a/src/shared/json.c b/src/shared/json.c
index 75795c2850..c410b62008 100644
--- a/src/shared/json.c
+++ b/src/shared/json.c
@@ -1585,6 +1585,9 @@ void json_variant_dump(JsonVariant *v, JsonFormatFlags flags, FILE *f, const cha
 
         print_source(f, v, flags, false);
 
+        if (((flags & (JSON_FORMAT_COLOR_AUTO|JSON_FORMAT_COLOR)) == JSON_FORMAT_COLOR_AUTO) && colors_enabled())
+                flags |= JSON_FORMAT_COLOR;
+
         if (flags & JSON_FORMAT_SSE)
                 fputs("data: ", f);
         if (flags & JSON_FORMAT_SEQ)
diff --git a/src/shared/json.h b/src/shared/json.h
index 04687d4135..4eba91c272 100644
--- a/src/shared/json.h
+++ b/src/shared/json.h
@@ -151,12 +151,13 @@ struct json_variant_foreach_state {
 int json_variant_get_source(JsonVariant *v, const char **ret_source, unsigned *ret_line, unsigned *ret_column);
 
 typedef enum JsonFormatFlags {
-        JSON_FORMAT_NEWLINE = 1 << 0, /* suffix with newline */
-        JSON_FORMAT_PRETTY  = 1 << 1, /* add internal whitespace to appeal to human readers */
-        JSON_FORMAT_COLOR   = 1 << 2, /* insert ANSI color sequences */
-        JSON_FORMAT_SOURCE  = 1 << 3, /* prefix with source filename/line/column */
-        JSON_FORMAT_SSE     = 1 << 4, /* prefix/suffix with W3C server-sent events */
-        JSON_FORMAT_SEQ     = 1 << 5, /* prefix/suffix with RFC 7464 application/json-seq */
+        JSON_FORMAT_NEWLINE    = 1 << 0, /* suffix with newline */
+        JSON_FORMAT_PRETTY     = 1 << 1, /* add internal whitespace to appeal to human readers */
+        JSON_FORMAT_COLOR      = 1 << 2, /* insert ANSI color sequences */
+        JSON_FORMAT_COLOR_AUTO = 1 << 3, /* insetr ANSI color sequences if colors_enabled() says so */
+        JSON_FORMAT_SOURCE     = 1 << 4, /* prefix with source filename/line/column */
+        JSON_FORMAT_SSE        = 1 << 5, /* prefix/suffix with W3C server-sent events */
+        JSON_FORMAT_SEQ        = 1 << 6, /* prefix/suffix with RFC 7464 application/json-seq */
 } JsonFormatFlags;
 
 int json_variant_format(JsonVariant *v, JsonFormatFlags flags, char **ret);