diff --git a/trafilatura/cli.py b/trafilatura/cli.py
index a07c0d40..391c136a 100644
--- a/trafilatura/cli.py
+++ b/trafilatura/cli.py
@@ -16,7 +16,7 @@
                         file_processing_pipeline, load_blacklist,
                         load_input_dict, probe_homepage,
                         url_processing_pipeline, write_result)
-from .settings import DOWNLOAD_THREADS
+from .settings import PARALLEL_CORES
 
 # fix output encoding on some systems
 try:
@@ -63,7 +63,7 @@ def parse_args(args):
 
     group1.add_argument('--parallel',
                         help="specify a number of cores/threads for downloads and/or processing",
-                        type=int, default=DOWNLOAD_THREADS)
+                        type=int, default=PARALLEL_CORES)
     group1.add_argument('-b', '--blacklist',
                         help="file containing unwanted URLs to discard during processing",
                         type=str)
diff --git a/trafilatura/cli_utils.py b/trafilatura/cli_utils.py
index 442a4a9c..ebddd177 100644
--- a/trafilatura/cli_utils.py
+++ b/trafilatura/cli_utils.py
@@ -13,8 +13,7 @@
 import string
 import sys
 import traceback
-from concurrent.futures import (ProcessPoolExecutor, ThreadPoolExecutor,
-                                as_completed)
+from concurrent.futures import ProcessPoolExecutor, ThreadPoolExecutor, as_completed
 from functools import partial
 from os import makedirs, path, walk
 
@@ -29,8 +28,7 @@
 from .filters import LANGID_FLAG, language_classifier
 from .hashing import generate_hash_filename
 from .meta import reset_caches
-from .settings import (FILE_PROCESSING_CORES, FILENAME_LEN,
-                       MAX_FILES_PER_DIRECTORY, use_config)
+from .settings import FILENAME_LEN, MAX_FILES_PER_DIRECTORY, use_config
 from .sitemaps import sitemap_search
 from .utils import URL_BLACKLIST_REGEX, make_chunks, uniquify_list
 
@@ -369,12 +367,11 @@ def url_processing_pipeline(args, url_store):
 def file_processing_pipeline(args):
     '''Define batches for parallel file processing and perform the extraction'''
     filecounter = None
-    processing_cores = args.parallel or FILE_PROCESSING_CORES
     config = use_config(filename=args.config_file)
     timeout = config.getint('DEFAULT', 'EXTRACTION_TIMEOUT') or None
 
     # max_tasks_per_child available in Python >= 3.11
-    with ProcessPoolExecutor(max_workers=processing_cores) as executor:
+    with ProcessPoolExecutor(max_workers=args.parallel) as executor:
         # chunk input: https://github.com/python/cpython/issues/74028
         for filebatch in make_chunks(generate_filelist(args.input_dir), MAX_FILES_PER_DIRECTORY):
             if filecounter is None and len(filebatch) >= MAX_FILES_PER_DIRECTORY:
diff --git a/trafilatura/settings.py b/trafilatura/settings.py
index 8e83e592..a2f0223c 100644
--- a/trafilatura/settings.py
+++ b/trafilatura/settings.py
@@ -8,7 +8,11 @@
 
 
 from configparser import ConfigParser
-from os import cpu_count
+try:
+    from os import sched_getaffinity
+except ImportError:
+    sched_getaffinity = None
+    from os import cpu_count
 from pathlib import Path
 
 from lxml.etree import XPath
@@ -31,13 +35,12 @@ def use_config(filename=None, config=None):
 DEFAULT_CONFIG = use_config()
 
 # Safety checks
-DOWNLOAD_THREADS = min(cpu_count(), 16)  # 16 processes at most
+PARALLEL_CORES = min(len(sched_getaffinity(0)) if sched_getaffinity else cpu_count(), 16)  # 16 processes at most
 LRU_SIZE = 4096
 
 # Files
 MAX_FILES_PER_DIRECTORY = 1000
 FILENAME_LEN = 8
-FILE_PROCESSING_CORES = min(cpu_count(), 16)  # 16 processes at most
 
 # Network
 MAX_LINKS = 10**6