diff --git a/spring-boot-project/spring-boot-docs/src/main/asciidoc/howto.adoc b/spring-boot-project/spring-boot-docs/src/main/asciidoc/howto.adoc
index ef9f7f9027d..6c77ea17233 100644
--- a/spring-boot-project/spring-boot-docs/src/main/asciidoc/howto.adoc
+++ b/spring-boot-project/spring-boot-docs/src/main/asciidoc/howto.adoc
@@ -2439,11 +2439,11 @@ of how to register handlers in the servlet container.
 === Sanitize sensible values
 Information returned by the `env` and `configprops` endpoints can be somewhat sensitive
 so keys matching a certain pattern are sanitized by default (i.e. their values are
-replaced by `******`).
+replaced by `+******+`).
 
 Spring Boot uses sensible defaults for such keys: for instance, any key ending with the
 word "password", "secret", "key" or "token" is sanitized. It is also possible to use a
-regular expression instead, such as `*credentials.*` to sanitize any key that holds the
+regular expression instead, such as `+*credentials.*+` to sanitize any key that holds the
 word `credentials` as part of the key.
 
 The patterns to use can be customized using the `management.endpoint.env.keys-to-sanitize`