diff --git a/man2/getrlimit.2 b/man2/getrlimit.2
index 5876c6f7c..24091137e 100644
--- a/man2/getrlimit.2
+++ b/man2/getrlimit.2
@@ -344,10 +344,11 @@ For further details, see
 .BR unix (7).
 .TP
 .B RLIMIT_NPROC
-This is the maximum number of processes
+This is a limit on the number of extant process
 (or, more precisely on Linux, threads)
-that can be created for the real user ID of the calling process.
-Upon encountering this limit,
+for the real user ID of the calling process.
+So long as the current number of processes belonging to this
+process's real user ID is greater than or equal to this limit,
 .BR fork (2)
 fails with the error
 .BR EAGAIN .