diff --git a/nixos/modules/services/web-servers/lighttpd/default.nix b/nixos/modules/services/web-servers/lighttpd/default.nix
index 0438e12e7da8..729a633a36cc 100644
--- a/nixos/modules/services/web-servers/lighttpd/default.nix
+++ b/nixos/modules/services/web-servers/lighttpd/default.nix
@@ -253,6 +253,7 @@ in
       after = [ "network.target" ];
       wantedBy = [ "multi-user.target" ];
       serviceConfig.ExecStart = "${cfg.package}/sbin/lighttpd -D -f ${configFile}";
+      serviceConfig.ExecReload = "${pkgs.coreutils}/bin/kill -SIGUSR1 $MAINPID";
       # SIGINT => graceful shutdown
       serviceConfig.KillSignal = "SIGINT";
     };
diff --git a/nixos/tests/lighttpd.nix b/nixos/tests/lighttpd.nix
index 36e2745c55c1..daef1584a45c 100644
--- a/nixos/tests/lighttpd.nix
+++ b/nixos/tests/lighttpd.nix
@@ -17,5 +17,6 @@ import ./make-test-python.nix ({ lib, pkgs, ... }: {
     server.wait_for_unit("lighttpd.service")
     res = server.succeed("curl --fail http://localhost/file.txt")
     assert "hello nixos test" in res, f"bad server response: '{res}'"
+    server.succeed("systemctl reload lighttpd")
   '';
 })