diff --git a/docs/production/deployment.md b/docs/production/deployment.md
index 529692bc25..f761c03a06 100644
--- a/docs/production/deployment.md
+++ b/docs/production/deployment.md
@@ -726,6 +726,16 @@ SSL/TLS termination.
 Set to the port number if you [prefer to listen on a port other than
 443](#using-an-alternate-port).
 
+#### `nginx_worker_connections`
+
+Adjust the [`worker_connections`][nginx_worker_connections] setting in
+the nginx server. This defaults to 10000; increasing it allows more
+concurrent connections per CPU core, at the cost of more memory
+consumed by NGINX. This number, times the number of CPU cores, should
+be more than twice the concurrent number of users.
+
+[nginx_worker_connections]: http://nginx.org/en/docs/ngx_core_module.html#worker_connections
+
 #### `queue_workers_multiprocess`
 
 By default, Zulip automatically detects whether the system has enough
diff --git a/puppet/zulip/manifests/nginx.pp b/puppet/zulip/manifests/nginx.pp
index 84d6d9caa0..d2743fb2f6 100644
--- a/puppet/zulip/manifests/nginx.pp
+++ b/puppet/zulip/manifests/nginx.pp
@@ -44,6 +44,7 @@ class zulip::nginx {
   } else {
       $ca_crt = '/etc/pki/tls/certs/ca-bundle.crt'
   }
+  $worker_connections = zulipconf('application_server', 'nginx_worker_connections', 10000)
   file { '/etc/nginx/nginx.conf':
     ensure  => file,
     require => Package[$zulip::common::nginx, 'ca-certificates'],
diff --git a/puppet/zulip/templates/nginx.conf.template.erb b/puppet/zulip/templates/nginx.conf.template.erb
index f9d38ba950..239394a713 100644
--- a/puppet/zulip/templates/nginx.conf.template.erb
+++ b/puppet/zulip/templates/nginx.conf.template.erb
@@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ include /etc/nginx/modules-enabled/*.conf;
 
 worker_rlimit_nofile 1000000;
 events {
-    worker_connections 1000000;
+    worker_connections <%= @worker_connections %>;
 
     use epoll;