diff --git a/docs/guestfs-hacking.pod b/docs/guestfs-hacking.pod
index 401dc9505..6d6458ba5 100644
--- a/docs/guestfs-hacking.pod
+++ b/docs/guestfs-hacking.pod
@@ -958,7 +958,9 @@ machine.  To do that, do:
 
 This also runs qemu with the "physical machine" disk (which you can
 set by setting C<PHYSICAL_MACHINE>), a virtual CD, and a variety of
-network cards for testing.
+network cards for testing.  You can change the qemu binary and add
+extra qemu options by setting C<QEMU> and/or C<QEMU_OPTIONS> on the
+make commandline.
 
 A third way to run virt-p2v simulates fairly accurately the program
 being downloaded over PXE and then doing an automatic conversion of
diff --git a/p2v/Makefile.am b/p2v/Makefile.am
index 0b8c1c66f..42483dabe 100644
--- a/p2v/Makefile.am
+++ b/p2v/Makefile.am
@@ -228,6 +228,7 @@ run-virt-p2v-in-a-vm: virt-p2v.img $(PHYSICAL_MACHINE)
 	  -device rtl8139,netdev=net1 \
 	  -netdev user,id=net2 \
 	  -device e1000,netdev=net2 \
+	  $(QEMU_OPTIONS) \
 	  &
 
 run-virt-p2v-non-gui-conversion: stamp-test-virt-p2v-pxe-data-files