diff --git a/doc/manual/command-ref/conf-file.xml b/doc/manual/command-ref/conf-file.xml
index c7b540892..1325a3f22 100644
--- a/doc/manual/command-ref/conf-file.xml
+++ b/doc/manual/command-ref/conf-file.xml
@@ -873,6 +873,14 @@ password <replaceable>my-password</replaceable>
 
   </varlistentry>
 
+  <varlistentry xml:id="conf-stalled-download-timeout"><term><literal>stalled-download-timeout</literal></term>
+    <listitem>
+      <para>The timeout (in seconds) for receiving data from servers
+      during download. Nix cancels idle downloads after this timeout's
+      duration.</para>
+    </listitem>
+  </varlistentry>
+
   <varlistentry xml:id="conf-substituters"><term><literal>substituters</literal></term>
 
     <listitem><para>A list of URLs of substituters, separated by
diff --git a/src/libstore/download.cc b/src/libstore/download.cc
index 91087eebc..c322d267d 100644
--- a/src/libstore/download.cc
+++ b/src/libstore/download.cc
@@ -236,8 +236,6 @@ struct CurlDownloader : public Downloader
             return ((DownloadItem *) userp)->readCallback(buffer, size, nitems);
         }
 
-        long lowSpeedTimeout = 300;
-
         void init()
         {
             if (!req) req = curl_easy_init();
@@ -297,7 +295,7 @@ struct CurlDownloader : public Downloader
             curl_easy_setopt(req, CURLOPT_CONNECTTIMEOUT, downloadSettings.connectTimeout.get());
 
             curl_easy_setopt(req, CURLOPT_LOW_SPEED_LIMIT, 1L);
-            curl_easy_setopt(req, CURLOPT_LOW_SPEED_TIME, lowSpeedTimeout);
+            curl_easy_setopt(req, CURLOPT_LOW_SPEED_TIME, downloadSettings.stalledDownloadTimeout.get());
 
             /* If no file exist in the specified path, curl continues to work
                anyway as if netrc support was disabled. */
diff --git a/src/libstore/download.hh b/src/libstore/download.hh
index 3b7fff3ba..c68381846 100644
--- a/src/libstore/download.hh
+++ b/src/libstore/download.hh
@@ -24,6 +24,9 @@ struct DownloadSettings : Config
     Setting<unsigned long> connectTimeout{this, 0, "connect-timeout",
         "Timeout for connecting to servers during downloads. 0 means use curl's builtin default."};
 
+    Setting<unsigned long> stalledDownloadTimeout{this, 300, "stalled-download-timeout",
+        "Timeout (in seconds) for receiving data from servers during download. Nix cancels idle downloads after this timeout's duration."};
+
     Setting<unsigned int> tries{this, 5, "download-attempts",
         "How often Nix will attempt to download a file before giving up."};
 };