diff --git a/src/p2p/net_node.inl b/src/p2p/net_node.inl
index ba6e79d3f..b99279bfa 100644
--- a/src/p2p/net_node.inl
+++ b/src/p2p/net_node.inl
@@ -502,7 +502,7 @@ namespace nodetool
     else
     {
       memcpy(&m_network_id, &::config::NETWORK_ID, 16);
-      if (m_exclusive_peers.empty())
+      if (m_exclusive_peers.empty() && !m_offline)
       {
       // for each hostname in the seed nodes list, attempt to DNS resolve and
       // add the result addresses as seed nodes