diff --git a/CHANGELOG.md b/CHANGELOG.md
index e4a822e4..0532c40e 100644
--- a/CHANGELOG.md
+++ b/CHANGELOG.md
@@ -34,6 +34,9 @@ Versioning](https://semver.org/spec/v2.0.0.html).
   allocations in certain situations. This is related to the similar issue that
   got fixed with yabridge 3.3.0. A fix for this issue has also been upstreamed
   to the library.
+- Respect `$XDG_DATA_HOME` when looking for yabridge's plugin host binaries
+  instead of hardcoding `~/.local/share/yabridge`. This matches the existing
+  behaviour in yabridgectl.
 
 ### Fixed
 
diff --git a/src/plugin/utils.cpp b/src/plugin/utils.cpp
index 34f6c33c..6ae09bae 100644
--- a/src/plugin/utils.cpp
+++ b/src/plugin/utils.cpp
@@ -373,8 +373,12 @@ std::vector<boost::filesystem::path> get_augmented_search_path() {
         boost::this_process::path();
 
     const bp::environment environment = boost::this_process::environment();
-    if (auto home_directory = environment.find("HOME");
-        home_directory != environment.end()) {
+    if (auto xdg_data_home = environment.find("XDG_DATA_HOME");
+        xdg_data_home != environment.end()) {
+        search_path.push_back(fs::path(xdg_data_home->to_string()) /
+                              "yabridge");
+    } else if (auto home_directory = environment.find("HOME");
+               home_directory != environment.end()) {
         search_path.push_back(fs::path(home_directory->to_string()) / ".local" /
                               "share" / "yabridge");
     }
diff --git a/src/plugin/utils.h b/src/plugin/utils.h
index a64b5a80..802e21ec 100644
--- a/src/plugin/utils.h
+++ b/src/plugin/utils.h
@@ -227,10 +227,11 @@ boost::filesystem::path generate_group_endpoint(
 
 /**
  * Return the search path as defined in `$PATH`, with `~/.local/share/yabridge`
- * appended to the end. I'd rather not do this since more magic makes things
- * harder to comprehend, but I can understand that modifying your login shell's
- * `PATH` environment variable can be a big hurdle if you've never done anything
- * like that before. And since this is the recommended installation location, it
+ * appended to the end. Even though it likely won't be set, this does respect
+ * `$XDG_DATA_HOME`. I'd rather not do this since more magic makes things harder
+ * to comprehend, but I can understand that modifying your login shell's `PATH`
+ * environment variable can be a big hurdle if you've never done anything like
+ * that before. And since this is the recommended installation location, it
  * makes sense to also search there by default.
  */
 std::vector<boost::filesystem::path> get_augmented_search_path();