diff --git a/org.eclipse.jgit/src/org/eclipse/jgit/treewalk/WorkingTreeIterator.java b/org.eclipse.jgit/src/org/eclipse/jgit/treewalk/WorkingTreeIterator.java
index ddf916f41..b2d91f889 100644
--- a/org.eclipse.jgit/src/org/eclipse/jgit/treewalk/WorkingTreeIterator.java
+++ b/org.eclipse.jgit/src/org/eclipse/jgit/treewalk/WorkingTreeIterator.java
@@ -950,9 +950,10 @@ public MetadataDiff compareMetadata(DirCacheEntry entry) {
 			if (fileLastModified.getEpochSecond() != cacheLastModified
 					.getEpochSecond()) {
 				return MetadataDiff.DIFFER_BY_TIMESTAMP;
+			} else if (entry.isSmudged()) {
+				return MetadataDiff.SMUDGED;
 			}
-		}
-		if (!fileLastModified.equals(cacheLastModified)) {
+		} else if (!fileLastModified.equals(cacheLastModified)) {
 			return MetadataDiff.DIFFER_BY_TIMESTAMP;
 		} else if (entry.isSmudged()) {
 			return MetadataDiff.SMUDGED;