diff --git a/lib/yargs-factory.ts b/lib/yargs-factory.ts
index 60c61266e..c093dbc36 100644
--- a/lib/yargs-factory.ts
+++ b/lib/yargs-factory.ts
@@ -1044,7 +1044,14 @@ export class YargsInstance {
       }
 
       const desc = opt.describe || opt.description || opt.desc;
-      this.describe(key, desc);
+      const descriptions = this.#usage.getDescriptions();
+      if (
+        !Object.prototype.hasOwnProperty.call(descriptions, key) ||
+        typeof desc === 'string'
+      ) {
+        this.describe(key, desc);
+      }
+
       if (opt.hidden) {
         this.hide(key);
       }
diff --git a/test/usage.cjs b/test/usage.cjs
index 31138889d..d80770879 100644
--- a/test/usage.cjs
+++ b/test/usage.cjs
@@ -4846,4 +4846,23 @@ describe('usage tests', () => {
         '  -v, --version  Custom version description                            [boolean]',
       ]);
   });
+
+  // https://github.com/yargs/yargs/issues/2169
+  it('allows multiple option calls to not clobber description', () => {
+    const r = checkUsage(() =>
+      yargs('--help')
+        .options({
+          arg: {desc: 'Old description', type: 'string', default: 'old'},
+        })
+        .options({arg: {default: 'new'}})
+        .wrap(null)
+        .parse()
+    );
+    r.logs[0]
+      .split('\n')
+      .slice(-1)[0]
+      .replace(/\s+/g, ' ')
+      .trim()
+      .should.equal('--arg Old description [string] [default: "new"]');
+  });
 });