diff --git a/CHANGELOG.md b/CHANGELOG.md
index fdaa253d1649..9a00e5054833 100644
--- a/CHANGELOG.md
+++ b/CHANGELOG.md
@@ -26,6 +26,8 @@ When releasing, please add the new-release-boilerplate to docs/pallas/CHANGELOG.
 * Changes
   * `JAX_CPU_COLLECTIVES_IMPLEMENTATION` and `JAX_NUM_CPU_DEVICES` now work as
     env vars. Before they could only be specified via jax.config or flags.
+  * `JAX_CPU_COLLECTIVES_IMPLEMENTATION` now defaults to `'gloo'`, meaning
+    multi-process CPU communication works out-of-the-box.
 
 ## jax 0.5.0 (Jan 17, 2025)
 
diff --git a/jax/_src/xla_bridge.py b/jax/_src/xla_bridge.py
index 51f00c56dd6a..9ef77913ac06 100644
--- a/jax/_src/xla_bridge.py
+++ b/jax/_src/xla_bridge.py
@@ -62,6 +62,8 @@
 
 MIN_COMPUTE_CAPABILITY = 52
 
+_DEFAULT_CPU_COLLECTIVES_IMPL = 'gloo'
+
 # TODO(phawkins): Remove jax_xla_backend.
 _XLA_BACKEND = config.string_flag(
     'jax_xla_backend', '',
@@ -235,7 +237,9 @@ def make_cpu_client(
   Returns:
     The created CPU client.
   """
-  if collectives is None:
+  # TODO(skyewm): use distributed.is_initialized() after
+  # https://github.com/jax-ml/jax/pull/26172 goes in.
+  if collectives is None and distributed.global_state.client is not None:
     collectives_impl = config.cpu_collectives_implementation.value
     if _CPU_ENABLE_GLOO_COLLECTIVES.value:
       collectives_impl = 'gloo'
@@ -244,6 +248,9 @@ def make_cpu_client(
                       '"jax_cpu_collectives_implementation", "gloo")` instead.',
                       DeprecationWarning,
                       )
+    if collectives_impl is None:
+      collectives_impl = _DEFAULT_CPU_COLLECTIVES_IMPL
+
     if collectives_impl == 'gloo':
       collectives = xla_client._xla.make_gloo_tcp_collectives(
         distributed_client=distributed.global_state.client,
@@ -252,8 +259,6 @@ def make_cpu_client(
       collectives = xla_client._xla.make_mpi_collectives()
       collectives.Init()
       atexit.register(collectives.Finalize)
-    elif collectives_impl == 'megascale':
-      raise ValueError('JAX_CPU_COLLECTIVES_IMPLEMENTATION must "gloo" or "mpi"')
     else:
       # Already validated by config module
       assert collectives_impl is None