diff --git a/drivers/vhost/net.c b/drivers/vhost/net.c
index 93f2d6741f34..28ad7752e0f3 100644
--- a/drivers/vhost/net.c
+++ b/drivers/vhost/net.c
@@ -197,8 +197,18 @@ static void vhost_zerocopy_callback(struct ubuf_info *ubuf, bool success)
 {
 	struct vhost_ubuf_ref *ubufs = ubuf->ctx;
 	struct vhost_virtqueue *vq = ubufs->vq;
+	int cnt = atomic_read(&ubufs->kref.refcount);
 
-	vhost_poll_queue(&vq->poll);
+	/*
+	 * Trigger polling thread if guest stopped submitting new buffers:
+	 * in this case, the refcount after decrement will eventually reach 1
+	 * so here it is 2.
+	 * We also trigger polling periodically after each 16 packets
+	 * (the value 16 here is more or less arbitrary, it's tuned to trigger
+	 * less than 10% of times).
+	 */
+	if (cnt <= 2 || !(cnt % 16))
+		vhost_poll_queue(&vq->poll);
 	/* set len to mark this desc buffers done DMA */
 	vq->heads[ubuf->desc].len = success ?
 		VHOST_DMA_DONE_LEN : VHOST_DMA_FAILED_LEN;