diff --git a/packages/playwright-core/src/utils/happy-eyeballs.ts b/packages/playwright-core/src/utils/happy-eyeballs.ts
index 4576da7899..37d5c1b271 100644
--- a/packages/playwright-core/src/utils/happy-eyeballs.ts
+++ b/packages/playwright-core/src/utils/happy-eyeballs.ts
@@ -45,8 +45,9 @@ class HttpsHappyEyeballsAgent extends https.Agent {
   }
 }
 
-export const httpsHappyEyeballsAgent = new HttpsHappyEyeballsAgent();
-export const httpHappyEyeballsAgent = new HttpHappyEyeballsAgent();
+// These options are aligned with the default Node.js globalAgent options.
+export const httpsHappyEyeballsAgent = new HttpsHappyEyeballsAgent({ keepAlive: true });
+export const httpHappyEyeballsAgent = new HttpHappyEyeballsAgent({ keepAlive: true });
 
 export async function createSocket(host: string, port: number): Promise<net.Socket> {
   return new Promise((resolve, reject) => {
diff --git a/tests/library/browsercontext-fetch.spec.ts b/tests/library/browsercontext-fetch.spec.ts
index 550cc56d74..f8c0327c7d 100644
--- a/tests/library/browsercontext-fetch.spec.ts
+++ b/tests/library/browsercontext-fetch.spec.ts
@@ -853,7 +853,7 @@ it('should not hang on a brotli encoded Range request', async ({ context, server
     headers: {
       range: 'bytes=0-2',
     },
-  })).rejects.toThrow(/(failed to decompress 'br' encoding: Error: unexpected end of file|Parse Error: Data after \`Connection: close\`)/);
+  })).rejects.toThrow(/Parse Error: Expected HTTP/);
 });
 
 it('should dispose', async function({ context, server }) {