diff --git a/changelog/9502.improvement.rst b/changelog/9502.improvement.rst
index 7174d7dbf..2eaf6a727 100644
--- a/changelog/9502.improvement.rst
+++ b/changelog/9502.improvement.rst
@@ -1 +1 @@
-Added an environment variable which helps to check if a code is running from within a pytest run
+Added :envvar:`PYTEST_VERSION` environment variable which is defined at the start of the pytest session and undefined afterwards. It contains the value of ``pytest.__version__``, and among other things can be used to easily check if code is running from within a pytest run.
diff --git a/testing/test_runner.py b/testing/test_runner.py
index ed5a0f80e..c4fb85a7e 100644
--- a/testing/test_runner.py
+++ b/testing/test_runner.py
@@ -1096,7 +1096,7 @@ def test_outcome_exception_bad_msg() -> None:
     assert str(excinfo.value) == expected
 
 
-def test_pytest_version(pytester: Pytester, monkeypatch: MonkeyPatch) -> None:
+def test_pytest_version_env_var(pytester: Pytester, monkeypatch: MonkeyPatch) -> None:
     pytester.makepyfile(
         """
         import pytest
@@ -1108,6 +1108,5 @@ def test_pytest_version(pytester: Pytester, monkeypatch: MonkeyPatch) -> None:
     """
     )
     result = pytester.runpytest_inprocess()
-    # assert result.ret == 0
     assert result.ret == ExitCode.OK
     assert "PYTEST_VERSION" not in os.environ