diff --git a/docs/changelog/84229.yaml b/docs/changelog/84229.yaml
new file mode 100644
index 0000000000000..a114f0f559f37
--- /dev/null
+++ b/docs/changelog/84229.yaml
@@ -0,0 +1,6 @@
+pr: 84229
+summary: Normalise polygons only when necessary
+area: Geo
+type: enhancement
+issues:
+ - 35349
diff --git a/server/src/main/java/org/elasticsearch/index/mapper/GeoShapeIndexer.java b/server/src/main/java/org/elasticsearch/index/mapper/GeoShapeIndexer.java
index ebc1e208d267a..ad57b8fe6a4d0 100644
--- a/server/src/main/java/org/elasticsearch/index/mapper/GeoShapeIndexer.java
+++ b/server/src/main/java/org/elasticsearch/index/mapper/GeoShapeIndexer.java
@@ -51,7 +51,9 @@ public List<IndexableField> indexShape(Geometry geometry) {
         if (geometry == null) {
             return Collections.emptyList();
         }
-        geometry = GeometryNormalizer.apply(orientation, geometry);
+        if (GeometryNormalizer.needsNormalize(orientation, geometry)) {
+            geometry = GeometryNormalizer.apply(orientation, geometry);
+        }
         LuceneGeometryIndexer visitor = new LuceneGeometryIndexer(name);
         geometry.visit(visitor);
         return visitor.fields();
@@ -125,7 +127,7 @@ public Void visit(Point point) {
 
         @Override
         public Void visit(Polygon polygon) {
-            addFields(LatLonShape.createIndexableFields(name, GeoShapeUtils.toLucenePolygon(polygon)));
+            addFields(LatLonShape.createIndexableFields(name, GeoShapeUtils.toLucenePolygon(polygon), true));
             return null;
         }
 
diff --git a/x-pack/plugin/spatial/src/test/java/org/elasticsearch/xpack/spatial/index/mapper/GeoShapeWithDocValuesFieldMapperTests.java b/x-pack/plugin/spatial/src/test/java/org/elasticsearch/xpack/spatial/index/mapper/GeoShapeWithDocValuesFieldMapperTests.java
index 51f314e82fda7..fe1f82fde5ea3 100644
--- a/x-pack/plugin/spatial/src/test/java/org/elasticsearch/xpack/spatial/index/mapper/GeoShapeWithDocValuesFieldMapperTests.java
+++ b/x-pack/plugin/spatial/src/test/java/org/elasticsearch/xpack/spatial/index/mapper/GeoShapeWithDocValuesFieldMapperTests.java
@@ -254,7 +254,7 @@ public void testIgnoreMalformedValues() throws IOException {
             ParsedDocument document = ignoreMapper.parse(sourceToParse);
             assertThat(document.docs().get(0).getFields("field").length, equalTo(0));
             MapperParsingException exception = expectThrows(MapperParsingException.class, () -> failMapper.parse(sourceToParse));
-            assertThat(exception.getCause().getMessage(), containsString("at least 4 polygon points required"));
+            assertThat(exception.getCause().getMessage(), containsString("at least three non-collinear points required"));
         }
     }