diff --git a/tools/testing/selftests/mm/khugepaged.c b/tools/testing/selftests/mm/khugepaged.c
index 8f221c792a28..d3a53673e1f9 100644
--- a/tools/testing/selftests/mm/khugepaged.c
+++ b/tools/testing/selftests/mm/khugepaged.c
@@ -141,8 +141,8 @@ static void get_finfo(const char *dir)
 		     major(path_stat.st_dev), minor(path_stat.st_dev))
 	    >= sizeof(path))
 		ksft_exit_fail_msg("%s: Pathname is too long\n", __func__);
-	if (read_file(path, buf, sizeof(buf)) < 0)
-		ksft_exit_fail_perror("read_file(read_num)");
+	if (!read_file(path, buf, sizeof(buf)))
+		ksft_exit_fail_perror("read_file(uevent)");
 	if (strstr(buf, "DEVTYPE=disk")) {
 		/* Found it */
 		if (snprintf(finfo.dev_queue_read_ahead_path,
diff --git a/tools/testing/selftests/mm/vm_util.c b/tools/testing/selftests/mm/vm_util.c
index 4fe4a5a610d1..4821a3563036 100644
--- a/tools/testing/selftests/mm/vm_util.c
+++ b/tools/testing/selftests/mm/vm_util.c
@@ -942,7 +942,7 @@ unsigned long read_num(const char *path)
 {
 	char buf[21];
 
-	if (read_file(path, buf, sizeof(buf)) < 0)
+	if (!read_file(path, buf, sizeof(buf)))
 		ksft_exit_fail_perror("read_file()");
 
 	return strtoul(buf, NULL, 10);