diff --git a/refs.c b/refs.c
index 8b9dfc6173..0f10c565bb 100644
--- a/refs.c
+++ b/refs.c
@@ -2827,7 +2827,8 @@ int repo_migrate_ref_storage_format(struct repository *repo,
 	if (ret < 0)
 		goto done;
 
-	transaction = ref_store_transaction_begin(new_refs, 0, errbuf);
+	transaction = ref_store_transaction_begin(new_refs, REF_TRANSACTION_FLAG_INITIAL,
+						  errbuf);
 	if (!transaction)
 		goto done;
 
@@ -2852,13 +2853,6 @@ int repo_migrate_ref_storage_format(struct repository *repo,
 	if (ret < 0)
 		goto done;
 
-	/*
-	 * TODO: we might want to migrate to `initial_ref_transaction_commit()`
-	 * here, which is more efficient for the files backend because it would
-	 * write new refs into the packed-refs file directly. At this point,
-	 * the files backend doesn't handle pseudo-refs and symrefs correctly
-	 * though, so this requires some more work.
-	 */
 	ret = ref_transaction_commit(transaction, errbuf);
 	if (ret < 0)
 		goto done;
diff --git a/t/t1460-refs-migrate.sh b/t/t1460-refs-migrate.sh
index f7c0783d30..b90b38a87f 100755
--- a/t/t1460-refs-migrate.sh
+++ b/t/t1460-refs-migrate.sh
@@ -237,7 +237,7 @@ test_expect_success 'migrating from reftable format deletes backend files' '
 	test_path_is_missing repo/.git/reftable &&
 	echo "ref: refs/heads/main" >expect &&
 	test_cmp expect repo/.git/HEAD &&
-	test_path_is_file repo/.git/refs/heads/main
+	test_path_is_file repo/.git/packed-refs
 '
 
 test_done