diff --git a/doc/users/next_whats_new/2019-01-06-pycairo-default.rst b/doc/users/next_whats_new/2019-01-06-pycairo-default.rst
new file mode 100644
index 000000000000..2d8143eb4dc9
--- /dev/null
+++ b/doc/users/next_whats_new/2019-01-06-pycairo-default.rst
@@ -0,0 +1,5 @@
+The cairo backend now defaults to pycairo instead of cairocffi
+``````````````````````````````````````````````````````````````
+
+This leads to faster import/runtime performance in some cases. The backend
+will fall back to cairocffi in case pycairo isn't available.
diff --git a/lib/matplotlib/backends/backend_cairo.py b/lib/matplotlib/backends/backend_cairo.py
index b14b94e91b76..6f6edd142249 100644
--- a/lib/matplotlib/backends/backend_cairo.py
+++ b/lib/matplotlib/backends/backend_cairo.py
@@ -10,21 +10,18 @@
 
 import numpy as np
 
-# cairocffi is more widely compatible than pycairo so try it first.
 try:
-    import cairocffi as cairo
+    import cairo
+    if cairo.version_info < (1, 11, 0):
+        # Introduced create_for_data for Py3.
+        raise ImportError
 except ImportError:
     try:
-        import cairo
+        import cairocffi as cairo
     except ImportError:
-        raise ImportError("cairo backend requires that cairocffi or pycairo "
-                          "is installed")
-    else:
-        if cairo.version_info < (1, 11, 0):
-            # Introduced create_for_data for Py3.
-            raise ImportError(
-                "cairo {} is installed; cairo>=1.11.0 is required"
-                .format(cairo.version))
+        raise ImportError(
+            "cairo backend requires that pycairo>=1.11.0 or cairocffi"
+            "is installed")
 
 backend_version = cairo.version