diff --git a/docs/guestfs-building.pod b/docs/guestfs-building.pod
index 187da37be..d7a0b521b 100644
--- a/docs/guestfs-building.pod
+++ b/docs/guestfs-building.pod
@@ -116,7 +116,7 @@ virt tools which are still written in Perl.
 
 I<Required>.  Part of Perl core.
 
-=item OCaml E<ge> 3.11
+=item OCaml E<ge> 4.02
 
 =item OCaml findlib
 
diff --git a/m4/guestfs_ocaml.m4 b/m4/guestfs_ocaml.m4
index f3d470929..e4b351ee5 100644
--- a/m4/guestfs_ocaml.m4
+++ b/m4/guestfs_ocaml.m4
@@ -38,15 +38,18 @@ AC_ARG_ENABLE([ocaml],
     [],
     [enable_ocaml=yes])
 
-dnl OCaml >= 3.11 is required.
-AC_MSG_CHECKING([if OCaml version >= 3.11])
+dnl OCaml >= 4.01 is required.
+ocaml_ver_str=4.01
+ocaml_min_major=4
+ocaml_min_minor=1
+AC_MSG_CHECKING([if OCaml version >= $ocaml_ver_str])
 ocaml_major="`echo $OCAMLVERSION | $AWK -F. '{print $1}'`"
-ocaml_minor="`echo $OCAMLVERSION | $AWK -F. '{print $2}'`"
-AS_IF([test "$ocaml_major" -ge 4 || ( test "$ocaml_major" -eq 3 && test "$ocaml_minor" -ge 11 )],[
-    AC_MSG_RESULT([yes])
+ocaml_minor="`echo $OCAMLVERSION | $AWK -F. '{print $2}' | sed 's/^0//'`"
+AS_IF([test "$ocaml_major" -ge $((ocaml_min_major+1)) || ( test "$ocaml_major" -eq $ocaml_min_major && test "$ocaml_minor" -ge $ocaml_min_minor )],[
+    AC_MSG_RESULT([yes ($ocaml_major, $ocaml_minor)])
 ],[
     AC_MSG_RESULT([no])
-    AC_MSG_FAILURE([OCaml compiler is not new enough.  At least OCaml 3.11 is required])
+    AC_MSG_FAILURE([OCaml compiler is not new enough.  At least OCaml $ocaml_ver_str is required])
 ])
 
 AM_CONDITIONAL([HAVE_OCAML],