diff --git a/.env.template b/.env.template
index 8da88cdc..5bc3d047 100644
--- a/.env.template
+++ b/.env.template
@@ -3,6 +3,11 @@
 ##
 ## Be aware that most of these settings will be overridden if they were changed
 ## in the admin interface. Those overrides are stored within DATA_FOLDER/config.json .
+##
+## By default, vaultwarden expects for this file to be named ".env" and located
+## in the current working directory. If this is not the case, the environment
+## variable ENV_FILE can be set to the location of this file prior to starting
+## vaultwarden.
 
 ## Main data folder
 # DATA_FOLDER=data
diff --git a/src/config.rs b/src/config.rs
index 9e1f5e56..bd89509d 100644
--- a/src/config.rs
+++ b/src/config.rs
@@ -56,7 +56,7 @@ macro_rules! make_config {
         impl ConfigBuilder {
             #[allow(clippy::field_reassign_with_default)]
             fn from_env() -> Self {
-                match dotenv::from_path(".env") {
+                match dotenv::from_path(get_env("ENV_FILE").unwrap_or_else(|| String::from(".env"))) {
                     Ok(_) => (),
                     Err(e) => match e {
                         dotenv::Error::LineParse(msg, pos) => {