diff --git a/nixos/doc/manual/release-notes/rl-2411.section.md b/nixos/doc/manual/release-notes/rl-2411.section.md
index e0a42ff87bab..85c880997692 100644
--- a/nixos/doc/manual/release-notes/rl-2411.section.md
+++ b/nixos/doc/manual/release-notes/rl-2411.section.md
@@ -727,6 +727,8 @@
 
 - `lib.misc.mapAttrsFlatten` is now formally deprecated and will be removed in future releases; use the identical [`lib.attrsets.mapAttrsToList`](https://nixos.org/manual/nixpkgs/unstable#function-library-lib.attrsets.mapAttrsToList) instead.
 
+- `virtualisation.docker.liveRestore` has been renamed to `virtualisation.docker.daemon.settings."live-restore"` and turned off by default for state versions of at least 24.11.
+
 - Tailscale's `authKeyFile` can now have its corresponding parameters set through `config.services.tailscale.authKeyParameters`, allowing for non-ephemeral unsupervised deployment and more.
   See [Registering new nodes using OAuth credentials](https://tailscale.com/kb/1215/oauth-clients#registering-new-nodes-using-oauth-credentials) for the supported options.
 
diff --git a/nixos/modules/virtualisation/docker.nix b/nixos/modules/virtualisation/docker.nix
index 4f38bc0b94d6..741828c7468a 100644
--- a/nixos/modules/virtualisation/docker.nix
+++ b/nixos/modules/virtualisation/docker.nix
@@ -52,10 +52,26 @@ in
 
     daemon.settings =
       mkOption {
-        type = settingsFormat.type;
+        type = types.submodule {
+          freeformType = settingsFormat.type;
+          options = {
+            live-restore = mkOption {
+              type = types.bool;
+              # Prior to NixOS 24.11, this was set to true by default, while upstream defaulted to false.
+              # Keep the option unset to follow upstream defaults
+              default = versionOlder config.system.stateVersion "24.11";
+              defaultText = literalExpression "lib.versionOlder config.system.stateVersion \"24.11\"";
+              description = ''
+                Allow dockerd to be restarted without affecting running container.
+                This option is incompatible with docker swarm.
+              '';
+            };
+          };
+        };
         default = { };
         example = {
           ipv6 = true;
+          "live-restore" = true;
           "fixed-cidr-v6" = "fd00::/80";
         };
         description = ''
@@ -75,16 +91,6 @@ in
         '';
       };
 
-    liveRestore =
-      mkOption {
-        type = types.bool;
-        default = true;
-        description = ''
-            Allow dockerd to be restarted without affecting running container.
-            This option is incompatible with docker swarm.
-          '';
-      };
-
     storageDriver =
       mkOption {
         type = types.nullOr (types.enum ["aufs" "btrfs" "devicemapper" "overlay" "overlay2" "zfs"]);
@@ -167,6 +173,11 @@ in
     };
   };
 
+  imports = [
+    (mkRemovedOptionModule ["virtualisation" "docker" "socketActivation"] "This option was removed and socket activation is now always active")
+    (mkAliasOptionModule ["virtualisation" "docker" "liveRestore"] ["virtualisation" "docker" "daemon" "settings" "live-restore"])
+  ];
+
   ###### implementation
 
   config = mkIf cfg.enable (mkMerge [{
@@ -253,7 +264,6 @@ in
         hosts = [ "fd://" ];
         log-driver = mkDefault cfg.logDriver;
         storage-driver = mkIf (cfg.storageDriver != null) (mkDefault cfg.storageDriver);
-        live-restore = mkDefault cfg.liveRestore;
         runtimes = mkIf cfg.enableNvidia {
           nvidia = {
             # Use the legacy nvidia-container-runtime wrapper to allow
@@ -266,9 +276,4 @@ in
       };
     }
   ]);
-
-  imports = [
-    (mkRemovedOptionModule ["virtualisation" "docker" "socketActivation"] "This option was removed and socket activation is now always active")
-  ];
-
 }