How to reset sysctl to it's OS defaults?

Solution 1:

As far as I know there is no "undo" for sysctl -- You need to re-enter the default settings (typically /etc/sysctl.conf simply does not specify defaults, so re-reading it won't revert your changes unless there's an explicit setting).

If you do not know your default settings a reboot will get them back, and you can then list them with sysctl -a (store this somewhere for reference). If you have another mostly-identical machine around you can grab the sysctl -a output from that host instead of rebooting.

Solution 2:

Sysctl Defaults

On CentOS 7, look at

/usr/lib/sysctl.d/

to get the default settings that ship with the OS.