diff --git a/meson.build b/meson.build
index 80175288c..a9116f90a 100644
--- a/meson.build
+++ b/meson.build
@@ -145,7 +145,7 @@ add_global_arguments(common_cppflags, language: 'cpp')
 enable_daemon = not is_windows and not is_android and get_option('daemon')
 conf.set('ENABLE_DAEMON', enable_daemon)
 
-conf.set('HAVE_LOCALE_H', compiler.has_header('locale.h'))
+conf.set('HAVE_CLOCALE', compiler.has_header('clocale'))
 
 conf.set('HAVE_GETPWNAM_R', compiler.has_function('getpwnam_r'))
 conf.set('HAVE_GETPWUID_R', compiler.has_function('getpwuid_r'))
diff --git a/src/Main.cxx b/src/Main.cxx
index b43fb14c8..bcba497ba 100644
--- a/src/Main.cxx
+++ b/src/Main.cxx
@@ -109,14 +109,12 @@
 #include <systemd/sd-daemon.h>
 #endif
 
-#include <stdlib.h>
-
-#ifdef HAVE_LOCALE_H
-#include <locale.h>
-#endif
-
 #include <climits>
 
+#ifdef HAVE_CLOCALE
+#include <clocale>
+#endif
+
 static constexpr size_t KILOBYTE = 1024;
 static constexpr size_t MEGABYTE = 1024 * KILOBYTE;
 
@@ -360,10 +358,10 @@ MainConfigured(const struct options &options, const ConfigData &raw_config)
 #endif
 
 #ifndef ANDROID
-#ifdef HAVE_LOCALE_H
+#ifdef HAVE_CLOCALE
 	/* initialize locale */
-	setlocale(LC_CTYPE,"");
-	setlocale(LC_COLLATE, "");
+	std::setlocale(LC_CTYPE,"");
+	std::setlocale(LC_COLLATE, "");
 #endif
 #endif