diff --git a/Documentation/gitattributes.txt b/Documentation/gitattributes.txt
index 508fe713c4..2d0a03715b 100644
--- a/Documentation/gitattributes.txt
+++ b/Documentation/gitattributes.txt
@@ -824,6 +824,8 @@ patterns are available:
 
 - `java` suitable for source code in the Java language.
 
+- `markdown` suitable for Markdown documents.
+
 - `matlab` suitable for source code in the MATLAB and Octave languages.
 
 - `objc` suitable for source code in the Objective-C language.
diff --git a/t/t4018-diff-funcname.sh b/t/t4018-diff-funcname.sh
index 02255a08bf..9d07797579 100755
--- a/t/t4018-diff-funcname.sh
+++ b/t/t4018-diff-funcname.sh
@@ -38,6 +38,7 @@ diffpatterns="
 	golang
 	html
 	java
+	markdown
 	matlab
 	objc
 	pascal
diff --git a/t/t4018/markdown-heading-indented b/t/t4018/markdown-heading-indented
new file mode 100644
index 0000000000..1991c2bd45
--- /dev/null
+++ b/t/t4018/markdown-heading-indented
@@ -0,0 +1,6 @@
+Indented headings are allowed, as long as the indent is no more than 3 spaces.
+
+   ### RIGHT
+
+- something
+- ChangeMe
diff --git a/t/t4018/markdown-heading-non-headings b/t/t4018/markdown-heading-non-headings
new file mode 100644
index 0000000000..c479c1a3f1
--- /dev/null
+++ b/t/t4018/markdown-heading-non-headings
@@ -0,0 +1,17 @@
+Headings can be right next to other lines of the file:
+# RIGHT
+Indents of four or more spaces make a code block:
+
+    # code comment, not heading
+
+If there's no space after the final hash, it's not a heading:
+
+#hashtag
+
+Sequences of more than 6 hashes don't make a heading:
+
+####### over-enthusiastic heading
+
+So the detected heading should be right up at the start of this file.
+
+ChangeMe
diff --git a/userdiff.c b/userdiff.c
index 30ab42df8e..1df884ef0b 100644
--- a/userdiff.c
+++ b/userdiff.c
@@ -79,6 +79,9 @@ PATTERNS("java",
 	 "|[-+0-9.e]+[fFlL]?|0[xXbB]?[0-9a-fA-F]+[lL]?"
 	 "|[-+*/<>%&^|=!]="
 	 "|--|\\+\\+|<<=?|>>>?=?|&&|\\|\\|"),
+PATTERNS("markdown",
+	 "^ {0,3}#{1,6}[ \t].*",
+	 "[^<>= \t]+"),
 PATTERNS("matlab",
 	 /*
 	  * Octave pattern is mostly the same as matlab, except that '%%%' and