diff --git a/src/shared/conf-parser.c b/src/shared/conf-parser.c
index 8fe177990a..b80c147807 100644
--- a/src/shared/conf-parser.c
+++ b/src/shared/conf-parser.c
@@ -137,7 +137,7 @@ static int next_assignment(
 
         /* Warn about unknown non-extension fields. */
         if (!(flags & CONFIG_PARSE_RELAXED) && !startswith(lvalue, "X-"))
-                log_syntax(unit, LOG_WARNING, filename, line, 0, "Unknown lvalue '%s' in section '%s'", lvalue, section);
+                log_syntax(unit, LOG_WARNING, filename, line, 0, "Unknown lvalue '%s' in section '%s', ignoring", lvalue, section);
 
         return 0;
 }
@@ -321,7 +321,7 @@ int config_parse(const char *unit,
                         return r;
                 }
 
-                if (strchr(COMMENTS, *buf))
+                if (strchr(COMMENTS, *skip_leading_chars(buf, WHITESPACE)))
                         continue;
 
                 l = buf;
diff --git a/src/test/test-conf-parser.c b/src/test/test-conf-parser.c
index 2921338f62..1738938fce 100644
--- a/src/test/test-conf-parser.c
+++ b/src/test/test-conf-parser.c
@@ -247,6 +247,18 @@ static const char* const config_file[] = {
         "2\\\n"
         "3\n",
 
+        "[Section]\n"
+        "   #hogehoge\\\n"   /* whitespaces before comments */
+        "   setting1=1\\\n"  /* whitespaces before key */
+        "2\\\n"
+        "3\n",
+
+        "[Section]\n"
+        "   setting1=1\\\n"  /* whitespaces before key */
+        "   #hogehoge\\\n"   /* commented out line prefixed with whitespaces in continuation */
+        "2\\\n"
+        "3\n",
+
         "[Section]\n"
         "setting1=1\\\n"     /* continuation with extra trailing backslash at the end */
         "2\\\n"
@@ -323,27 +335,27 @@ static void test_config_parse(unsigned i, const char *s) {
                 assert_se(streq(setting1, "1"));
                 break;
 
-        case 4 ... 7:
+        case 4 ... 9:
                 assert_se(r == 0);
                 assert_se(streq(setting1, "1 2 3"));
                 break;
 
-        case 8:
+        case 10:
                 assert_se(r == 0);
                 assert_se(streq(setting1, "1\\\\ \\\\2"));
                 break;
 
-        case 9:
+        case 11:
                 assert_se(r == 0);
                 assert_se(streq(setting1, x1000("ABCD")));
                 break;
 
-        case 10 ... 11:
+        case 12 ... 13:
                 assert_se(r == 0);
                 assert_se(streq(setting1, x1000("ABCD") " foobar"));
                 break;
 
-        case 12 ... 13:
+        case 14 ... 15:
                 assert_se(r == -ENOBUFS);
                 assert_se(setting1 == NULL);
                 break;