diff --git a/cmd/esbuild/main.go b/cmd/esbuild/main.go
index 76712ccc8f6..67744f00bca 100644
--- a/cmd/esbuild/main.go
+++ b/cmd/esbuild/main.go
@@ -282,20 +282,23 @@ func main() {
 				exitCode = cli.Run(osArgs)
 			}
 		} else {
-			// Don't disable the GC if this is a long-running process
 			isServeOrWatch := false
+			nonFlagCount := 0
 			for _, arg := range osArgs {
-				if arg == "--serve" || arg == "--watch" || strings.HasPrefix(arg, "--serve=") {
+				if !strings.HasPrefix(arg, "-") {
+					nonFlagCount++
+				} else if arg == "--serve" || arg == "--watch" || strings.HasPrefix(arg, "--serve=") {
 					isServeOrWatch = true
-					break
 				}
 			}
 
-			if !isServeOrWatch {
-				// Disable the GC since we're just going to allocate a bunch of memory
-				// and then exit anyway. This speedup is not insignificant. Make sure to
-				// only do this here once we know that we're not going to be a long-lived
-				// process though.
+			if !isServeOrWatch && nonFlagCount <= 1 {
+				// If this is not a long-running process and there is at most a single
+				// entry point, then disable the GC since we're just going to allocate
+				// a bunch of memory and then exit anyway. This speedup is not
+				// insignificant. We don't do this when there are multiple entry points
+				// since otherwise esbuild could unnecessarily use much more memory
+				// than it might otherwise need to process many entry points.
 				debug.SetGCPercent(-1)
 			} else if !isStdinTTY && !isWatchForever {
 				// If stdin isn't a TTY, watch stdin and abort in case it is closed.