diff --git a/changelog/unreleased/freebsd-xattr-support.md b/changelog/unreleased/freebsd-xattr-support.md
new file mode 100644
index 0000000000..adac064195
--- /dev/null
+++ b/changelog/unreleased/freebsd-xattr-support.md
@@ -0,0 +1,5 @@
+Bugfix: FreeBSD xattr support
+
+We now properly handle FreeBSD xattr namespaces by leaving out the `user.` prefix. FreeBSD adds that automatically.
+
+https://github.com/cs3org/reva/pull/3650
\ No newline at end of file
diff --git a/pkg/storage/utils/decomposedfs/xattrs/xattrs.go b/pkg/storage/utils/decomposedfs/xattrs/xattrs.go
index 496071b37a..695a5a3854 100644
--- a/pkg/storage/utils/decomposedfs/xattrs/xattrs.go
+++ b/pkg/storage/utils/decomposedfs/xattrs/xattrs.go
@@ -36,9 +36,8 @@ import (
 // A non root user can only manipulate the user. namespace, which is what
 // we will use to store ownCloud specific metadata. To prevent name
 // collisions with other apps We are going to introduce a sub namespace
-// "user.ocis."
+// "user.ocis." in the xattrs_prefix*.go files.
 const (
-	OcisPrefix    string = "user.ocis."
 	ParentidAttr  string = OcisPrefix + "parentid"
 	OwnerIDAttr   string = OcisPrefix + "owner.id"
 	OwnerIDPAttr  string = OcisPrefix + "owner.idp"
diff --git a/pkg/storage/utils/decomposedfs/xattrs/xattrs_prefix.go b/pkg/storage/utils/decomposedfs/xattrs/xattrs_prefix.go
new file mode 100644
index 0000000000..c8277ae58c
--- /dev/null
+++ b/pkg/storage/utils/decomposedfs/xattrs/xattrs_prefix.go
@@ -0,0 +1,11 @@
+//go:build !freebsd
+
+package xattrs
+
+// The default namespace for ocis. As non root users can only manipulate
+// the user. namespace, which is what is used to store ownCloud specific
+// metadata. To prevent name collisions with other apps, we are going to
+// introduce a sub namespace "user.ocis."
+const (
+	OcisPrefix string = "user.ocis."
+)
diff --git a/pkg/storage/utils/decomposedfs/xattrs/xattrs_prefix_freebsd.go b/pkg/storage/utils/decomposedfs/xattrs/xattrs_prefix_freebsd.go
new file mode 100644
index 0000000000..4dd2323590
--- /dev/null
+++ b/pkg/storage/utils/decomposedfs/xattrs/xattrs_prefix_freebsd.go
@@ -0,0 +1,10 @@
+//go:build freebsd
+
+package xattrs
+
+// On FreeBSD the `user` namespace is implied through a separate syscall argument
+// and will fail with invalid argument when you try to start an xattr name with user. or system.
+// For that reason we drop the superfluous user. prefix for FreeBSD specifically.
+const (
+	OcisPrefix string = "ocis."
+)