Make “make” default to “make -j 8”

Question

Is there a way that I can make

$ make

default to:

$ make -j 8

?

Answer 1

Add

MAKEOPTS='-j8'
MAKEFLAGS='-j8'

to /etc/make.conf (create it if it doesn't already exist).

If that doesn't work, add

export MAKEOPTS='-j8'
export MAKEFLAGS='-j8'

to your system-wide profile (e.g., /etc/profile).

For me, MAKEOPTS alone didn't work. Possibly MAKEFLAGS is all that's needed.