diff --git a/.circleci/config.yml b/.circleci/config.yml
index f94d7d64b20a..bb85fe6ccfbb 100644
--- a/.circleci/config.yml
+++ b/.circleci/config.yml
@@ -688,16 +688,13 @@ jobs:
       - run: cd bit && bbit init
       - run:
           name: bbit install
-          # the user-agent append labels registry requests from CI installs (the committed .npmrc
-          # says bit-repo-local). skip-worktree keeps the mutation out of any later commit made
-          # from this workspace (e.g. the version-bump commit of `bit ci merge`, which stages all
-          # tracked changes) — without it, a duplicate user-agent line lands on master every
-          # release and, being last in the file, overrides bit-repo-local for local installs too.
-          # the flag lives in .git/index, so it survives persist_to_workspace into later jobs.
+          # pnpm v12 stores the project user-agent in pnpm-workspace.yaml. Override the tracked
+          # local marker only in this CI worktree, then keep the temporary change out of later
+          # commits made from the persisted checkout (notably the release version bump).
           command: >
             cd bit &&
-            echo "user-agent=bit-repo-circleci" >> .npmrc &&
-            git update-index --skip-worktree .npmrc &&
+            pnpm config set --location=project userAgent bit-repo-circleci &&
+            git update-index --skip-worktree pnpm-workspace.yaml &&
             bbit install
       # `bbit install` compiles as part of the install, but that pass can fall back to the
       # default TypeScript compiler for components whose env is still being imported - notably
diff --git a/.npmrc b/.npmrc
deleted file mode 100644
index 735ee04888f9..000000000000
--- a/.npmrc
+++ /dev/null
@@ -1 +0,0 @@
-user-agent=bit-repo-local
diff --git a/pnpm-workspace.yaml b/pnpm-workspace.yaml
new file mode 100644
index 000000000000..14e918379304
--- /dev/null
+++ b/pnpm-workspace.yaml
@@ -0,0 +1,4 @@
+# Marks installs performed inside this repository at the registry, so the bit
+# CLI repo's own traffic can be told apart from real users' installs. pnpm v12
+# reads settings like this one here rather than from .npmrc.
+userAgent: bit-repo