diff --git a/docs/_static/theme_overrides.css b/docs/_static/theme_overrides.css
index 7418fa63ec..321d76146c 100644
--- a/docs/_static/theme_overrides.css
+++ b/docs/_static/theme_overrides.css
@@ -9,3 +9,7 @@
 .wy-table-responsive {
     overflow: visible !important;
 }
+
+.wy-side-nav-search > a.home-link {
+    font-weight: 100;
+}
diff --git a/docs/_templates/layout.html b/docs/_templates/layout.html
index 5ead1c534f..70dd02e878 100644
--- a/docs/_templates/layout.html
+++ b/docs/_templates/layout.html
@@ -1,4 +1,29 @@
 {% extends "!layout.html" %}
+
+{% block sidebartitle %}
+    {%- if logo and theme_logo_only %}
+        <a href="{{ pathto(master_doc) }}">
+            <img src="{{ pathto('_static/' + logo, 1) }}" class="logo" alt="{{ _('Logo') }}"/>
+        </a>
+    {%- endif %}
+
+    {%- if theme_display_version %}
+        {%- set nav_version = version %}
+        {%- if READTHEDOCS and current_version %}
+            {%- set nav_version = current_version %}
+        {%- endif %}
+        {%- if nav_version %}
+            <div class="version">
+                {{ nav_version }}
+            </div>
+        {%- endif %}
+    {%- endif %}
+
+    <a class="reference external home-link" href="https://zulip.com/">Zulip homepage</a>
+
+    {%- include "searchbox.html" %}
+{% endblock %}
+
 {% block document %}
     {#
     # This allows us to insert a warning that appears only on the development
diff --git a/tools/check-templates b/tools/check-templates
index 0910d2594f..ffd771bf72 100755
--- a/tools/check-templates
+++ b/tools/check-templates
@@ -26,6 +26,8 @@ EXCLUDED_FILES = [
     "templates/zerver/emails/missed_message.source.html",
     # Previously unchecked and our parser doesn't like its indentation
     "static/assets/icons/template.hbs",
+    # The parser does not like the indentation of custom ReadTheDocs templates
+    "docs/_templates/layout.html",
 ]