diff --git a/doc/users/whats_new/streamplot_zorder.rst b/doc/users/whats_new/streamplot_zorder.rst
new file mode 100644
index 000000000000..ac8e15f3aee8
--- /dev/null
+++ b/doc/users/whats_new/streamplot_zorder.rst
@@ -0,0 +1,7 @@
+Streamplot Zorder Keyword Argument Changes
+------------------------------------------
+
+The ``zorder`` parameter for :func:`streamplot` now has default
+value of ``None`` instead of ``2``. If ``None`` is given as ``zorder``,
+:func:`streamplot` has a default ``zorder`` of 
+``matplotlib.lines.Line2D.zorder``.
diff --git a/lib/matplotlib/axes/_axes.py b/lib/matplotlib/axes/_axes.py
index 0d87c5566829..74d90a21f709 100644
--- a/lib/matplotlib/axes/_axes.py
+++ b/lib/matplotlib/axes/_axes.py
@@ -4613,7 +4613,8 @@ def stackplot(self, x, *args, **kwargs):
                          label_namer=None)
     def streamplot(self, x, y, u, v, density=1, linewidth=None, color=None,
                    cmap=None, norm=None, arrowsize=1, arrowstyle='-|>',
-                   minlength=0.1, transform=None, zorder=2, start_points=None):
+                   minlength=0.1, transform=None, zorder=None,
+                   start_points=None):
         if not self._hold:
             self.cla()
         stream_container = mstream.streamplot(self, x, y, u, v,
diff --git a/lib/matplotlib/streamplot.py b/lib/matplotlib/streamplot.py
index f46e3d66ed58..cbc413b2312e 100644
--- a/lib/matplotlib/streamplot.py
+++ b/lib/matplotlib/streamplot.py
@@ -13,6 +13,7 @@
 import matplotlib.cm as cm
 import matplotlib.colors as mcolors
 import matplotlib.collections as mcollections
+import matplotlib.lines as mlines
 import matplotlib.patches as patches
 
 
@@ -21,7 +22,7 @@
 
 def streamplot(axes, x, y, u, v, density=1, linewidth=None, color=None,
                cmap=None, norm=None, arrowsize=1, arrowstyle='-|>',
-               minlength=0.1, transform=None, zorder=2, start_points=None):
+               minlength=0.1, transform=None, zorder=None, start_points=None):
     """Draws streamlines of a vector flow.
 
     *x*, *y* : 1d arrays
@@ -78,6 +79,9 @@ def streamplot(axes, x, y, u, v, density=1, linewidth=None, color=None,
     mask = StreamMask(density)
     dmap = DomainMap(grid, mask)
 
+    if zorder is None:
+        zorder = mlines.Line2D.zorder
+
     # default to data coordinates
     if transform is None:
         transform = axes.transData