diff --git a/tensorflow/compiler/xla/service/dump.cc b/tensorflow/compiler/xla/service/dump.cc
index d251c828bcd..6a4837211e8 100644
--- a/tensorflow/compiler/xla/service/dump.cc
+++ b/tensorflow/compiler/xla/service/dump.cc
@@ -48,22 +48,27 @@ struct CanonicalDebugOptions {
     // function we treat this struct's members as write-only, and read only from
     // `opts`.
 
-    // If dump_to is empty, default to dumping to stdout.
-    if (opts.xla_dump_to().empty()) {
-      dump_to = "-";
-    }
-
     // Did the user specifiy an explicit format for dumping?
-    bool output_format_specified =
+    bool output_format_other_than_url_specified =
         opts.xla_dump_hlo_as_text() || opts.xla_dump_hlo_as_proto() ||
         opts.xla_dump_hlo_as_dot() || opts.xla_dump_hlo_as_html() ||
-        opts.xla_dump_hlo_as_url() || opts.xla_dump_hlo_snapshots();
+        opts.xla_dump_hlo_snapshots();
+    bool output_format_specified =
+        output_format_other_than_url_specified || opts.xla_dump_hlo_as_url();
 
     // If we haven't specified an output format, default to dumping as text.
     if (!output_format_specified) {
       dump_as_text = true;
     }
 
+    // If dump_to is empty, default to dumping to stdout, so long as some dump
+    // format other than dump-as-url was specified.  If the user only specified
+    // --xla_dump_hlo_as_url, then don't dump to stdout, that is likely noise
+    // they don't want.
+    if (opts.xla_dump_to().empty() && output_format_other_than_url_specified) {
+      dump_to = "-";
+    }
+
     // If we specified a regular expression restricting which modules to dump,
     // respect that.
     //
@@ -143,6 +148,10 @@ void DumpToFileInDirImpl(string_view filename, string_view contents,
     return;
   }
 
+  if (opts.dump_to.empty()) {
+    return;
+  }
+
   const string& dir = opts.dump_to;
   VLOG(1) << "Dumping " << filename << " to " << dir;