diff --git a/drivers/block/virtio_blk.c b/drivers/block/virtio_blk.c
index 54158766334b..adfe43f5ffe4 100644
--- a/drivers/block/virtio_blk.c
+++ b/drivers/block/virtio_blk.c
@@ -245,10 +245,12 @@ static blk_status_t virtio_queue_rq(struct blk_mq_hw_ctx *hctx,
 	err = virtblk_add_req(vblk->vqs[qid].vq, vbr, vbr->sg, num);
 	if (err) {
 		virtqueue_kick(vblk->vqs[qid].vq);
-		blk_mq_stop_hw_queue(hctx);
+		/* Don't stop the queue if -ENOMEM: we may have failed to
+		 * bounce the buffer due to global resource outage.
+		 */
+		if (err == -ENOSPC)
+			blk_mq_stop_hw_queue(hctx);
 		spin_unlock_irqrestore(&vblk->vqs[qid].lock, flags);
-		/* Out of mem doesn't actually happen, since we fall back
-		 * to direct descriptors */
 		if (err == -ENOMEM || err == -ENOSPC)
 			return BLK_STS_DEV_RESOURCE;
 		return BLK_STS_IOERR;