diff --git a/docs/api-guide/serializers.md b/docs/api-guide/serializers.md
index da57ac0a4..cb308d17c 100644
--- a/docs/api-guide/serializers.md
+++ b/docs/api-guide/serializers.md
@@ -255,7 +255,8 @@ When passing data to a serializer instance, the unmodified data will be made ava
 
 ## Partial updates
 
-By default, serializers must be passed values for all required fields or they will raise validation errors. You can use the `partial` argument in order to allow partial updates.
+By default, serializers must be passed values for all required fields or they will raise validation errors. You can use the `partial` argument in order to allow partial updates. Note that `STRICT_PARTIAL_UPDATE` must be set to `True` to enable field specific updates using `.save(update_fields=[...])` for `ModelSerializer`
+with `partial=True`. 
 
     # Update `comment` with partial data
     serializer = CommentSerializer(comment, data={'content': 'foo bar'}, partial=True)