diff --git a/CHANGELOG.md b/CHANGELOG.md
index 2ef43e77f07..bf48c6354c6 100644
--- a/CHANGELOG.md
+++ b/CHANGELOG.md
@@ -32,6 +32,9 @@ release.
 
 ### Common
 
+- Update instrumentation library guidance to avoid naming collisions between external and OTel instrumentations.
+  ([#4187](https://github.com/open-telemetry/opentelemetry-specification/pull/4187))
+
 ### Supplementary Guidelines
 
 ## v1.36.0 (2024-08-12)
diff --git a/specification/overview.md b/specification/overview.md
index 5eb7b3d410c..1138fdd30fe 100644
--- a/specification/overview.md
+++ b/specification/overview.md
@@ -384,9 +384,17 @@ an [Instrumentation Library](glossary.md#instrumentation-library).
 An instrumentation library should be named to follow any naming conventions of
 the instrumented library (e.g. 'middleware' for a web framework).
 
-If there is no established name, the recommendation is to prefix packages
-with "opentelemetry-instrumentation", followed by the instrumented library
-name itself. Examples include:
+For instrumentation hosted in OpenTelemetry repositories, the recommendation is
+to prefix packages with "opentelemetry-instrumentation", followed by the
+instrumented library name itself. Examples include:
 
 * opentelemetry-instrumentation-flask (Python)
 * @opentelemetry/instrumentation-grpc (Javascript)
+
+Instrumentations libraries not hosted by OpenTelemetry should avoid
+potential naming collisions with OpenTelemetry-hosted packages.
+For example, they may prefix instrumentation package name with their company or
+project name:
+
+* {company}-opentelemetry-instrumentation-{component} (Python)
+* @{company}/opentelemetry-instrumentation-{component} (Javascript)