diff --git a/diff.c b/diff.c
index 0aef3db6e1..fb8bc8aadb 100644
--- a/diff.c
+++ b/diff.c
@@ -6346,6 +6346,7 @@ void diff_free(struct diff_options *options)
 	diff_free_file(options);
 	diff_free_ignore_regex(options);
 	clear_pathspec(&options->pathspec);
+	FREE_AND_NULL(options->parseopts);
 }
 
 void diff_flush(struct diff_options *options)