diff --git a/bus/bus.c b/bus/bus.c
index f892e262..66633470 100644
--- a/bus/bus.c
+++ b/bus/bus.c
@@ -644,6 +644,24 @@ oom:
   return FALSE;
 }
 
+static void
+raise_file_descriptor_limit (BusContext      *context)
+{
+
+  /* I just picked this out of thin air; we need some extra
+   * descriptors for things like any internal pipes we create,
+   * inotify, connections to SELinux, etc.
+   */
+  unsigned int arbitrary_extra_fds = 32;
+  unsigned int limit;
+
+  limit = context->limits.max_completed_connections +
+    context->limits.max_incomplete_connections
+    + arbitrary_extra_fds;
+
+  _dbus_request_file_descriptor_limit (limit);
+}
+
 static dbus_bool_t
 process_config_postinit (BusContext      *context,
 			 BusConfigParser *parser,
@@ -652,6 +670,8 @@ process_config_postinit (BusContext      *context,
   DBusHashTable *service_context_table;
   DBusList *watched_dirs = NULL;
 
+  raise_file_descriptor_limit (context);
+
   service_context_table = bus_config_parser_steal_service_context_table (parser);
   if (!bus_registry_set_service_context_table (context->registry,
 					       service_context_table))
diff --git a/configure.in b/configure.in
index 08bd962d..e6b0fefa 100644
--- a/configure.in
+++ b/configure.in
@@ -532,6 +532,8 @@ closedir(dirp);
 	fi
 fi
 
+AC_CHECK_HEADERS(sys/resource.h)
+
 AC_CHECK_HEADERS(dirent.h)
 
 AC_CHECK_HEADERS(execinfo.h, [AC_CHECK_FUNCS(backtrace)])
diff --git a/dbus/dbus-sysdeps-util-unix.c b/dbus/dbus-sysdeps-util-unix.c
index 6e092458..02954d5c 100644
--- a/dbus/dbus-sysdeps-util-unix.c
+++ b/dbus/dbus-sysdeps-util-unix.c
@@ -42,6 +42,9 @@
 #include <errno.h>
 #include <fcntl.h>
 #include <sys/stat.h>
+#ifdef HAVE_SYS_RESOURCE_H
+#include <sys/resource.h>
+#endif
 #include <grp.h>
 #include <sys/socket.h>
 #include <dirent.h>
@@ -369,6 +372,56 @@ _dbus_change_to_daemon_user  (const char    *user,
 }
 #endif /* !HAVE_LIBAUDIT */
 
+
+/**
+ * Attempt to ensure that the current process can open
+ * at least @limit file descriptors.
+ *
+ * If @limit is lower than the current, it will not be
+ * lowered.  No error is returned if the request can
+ * not be satisfied.
+ *
+ * @limit Number of file descriptors
+ */
+void
+_dbus_request_file_descriptor_limit (unsigned int limit)
+{
+#ifdef HAVE_SETRLIMIT
+  struct rlimit lim;
+  struct rlimit target_lim;
+  unsigned int current_limit;
+
+  /* No point to doing this practically speaking
+   * if we're not uid 0.  We expect the system
+   * bus to use this before we change UID, and
+   * the session bus takes the Linux default
+   * of 1024 for both cur and max.
+   */
+  if (getuid () != 0)
+    return;
+
+  if (getrlimit (RLIMIT_NOFILE, &lim) < 0)
+    return;
+
+  if (lim.rlim_cur >= limit)
+    return;
+
+  /* Ignore "maximum limit", assume we have the "superuser"
+   * privileges.  On Linux this is CAP_SYS_RESOURCE.
+   */
+  target_lim.rlim_cur = target_lim.rlim_max = limit;
+  /* Also ignore errors; if we fail, we will at least work
+   * up to whatever limit we had, which seems better than
+   * just outright aborting.
+   *
+   * However, in the future we should probably log this so OS builders
+   * have a chance to notice any misconfiguration like dbus-daemon
+   * being started without CAP_SYS_RESOURCE.
+   */
+  setrlimit (RLIMIT_NOFILE, &target_lim);
+#endif
+}
+
 void 
 _dbus_init_system_log (void)
 {
diff --git a/dbus/dbus-sysdeps-util-win.c b/dbus/dbus-sysdeps-util-win.c
index 2f214092..f10100b6 100644
--- a/dbus/dbus-sysdeps-util-win.c
+++ b/dbus/dbus-sysdeps-util-win.c
@@ -256,6 +256,11 @@ _dbus_change_to_daemon_user  (const char    *user,
   return TRUE;
 }
 
+void
+_dbus_request_file_descriptor_limit (unsigned int limit)
+{
+}
+
 void
 _dbus_init_system_log (void)
 {
diff --git a/dbus/dbus-sysdeps.h b/dbus/dbus-sysdeps.h
index 3955d829..22d7969e 100644
--- a/dbus/dbus-sysdeps.h
+++ b/dbus/dbus-sysdeps.h
@@ -517,6 +517,8 @@ dbus_bool_t _dbus_change_to_daemon_user (const char *user,
 
 void _dbus_flush_caches (void);
 
+void _dbus_request_file_descriptor_limit (unsigned int limit);
+
 /*
  * replaces the term DBUS_PREFIX in configure_time_path by the
  * current dbus installation directory. On unix this function is a noop