diff --git a/docs/changelog.rst b/docs/changelog.rst
index 4d9884e51..4eef49ae3 100644
--- a/docs/changelog.rst
+++ b/docs/changelog.rst
@@ -1,6 +1,14 @@
 Changelog
 =========
 
+Unreleased
+----------
+
+Features
+^^^^^^^^
+
+* Added a new option `--no-foce-no-debug` to avoid forcing of DEBUG setting to False (bubenkoff)
+
 2.8.0
 -----
 
diff --git a/docs/configuring_django.rst b/docs/configuring_django.rst
index 6281434b2..4181c0d10 100644
--- a/docs/configuring_django.rst
+++ b/docs/configuring_django.rst
@@ -74,3 +74,15 @@ This can be done from your project's ``conftest.py`` file::
     def pytest_configure():
         settings.configure(DATABASES=...)
 
+
+``DEBUG`` setting during the test run
+-------------------------------------
+
+Default django test runner behavior is to force DEBUG setting to False. So does the ``pytest-django``.
+But sometimes, especially for functional tests, you might want to avoid this, to debug why certain page does not work.
+
+Command Line Option::
+
+    $ py.test --no-force-no-debug
+
+will make sure that DEBUG is not forced to False, so you can set it to True in your test settings.
diff --git a/pytest_django/plugin.py b/pytest_django/plugin.py
index 31a967aac..24800187f 100644
--- a/pytest_django/plugin.py
+++ b/pytest_django/plugin.py
@@ -51,6 +51,9 @@ def pytest_addoption(parser):
     group._addoption('--nomigrations',
                      action='store_true', dest='nomigrations', default=False,
                      help='Disable Django 1.7 migrations on test setup')
+    group._addoption('--no-force-no-debug',
+                     action='store_true', dest='noforcenodebug', default=False,
+                     help='Disable forcing DEBUG setting to False on test setup')
     parser.addini(CONFIGURATION_ENV,
                   'django-configurations class to use by pytest-django.')
     group._addoption('--liveserver', default=None,
@@ -236,7 +239,8 @@ def _django_test_environment(request):
     if django_settings_is_configured():
         from django.conf import settings
         from .compat import setup_test_environment, teardown_test_environment
-        settings.DEBUG = False
+        if not request.config.getvalue('noforcenodebug'):
+            settings.DEBUG = False
         setup_test_environment()
         request.addfinalizer(teardown_test_environment)
 
diff --git a/tests/test_django_settings_module.py b/tests/test_django_settings_module.py
index 93e1dfa08..10b6682b0 100644
--- a/tests/test_django_settings_module.py
+++ b/tests/test_django_settings_module.py
@@ -244,6 +244,31 @@ def test_debug_is_false():
     assert r.ret == 0
 
 
+def test_debug_no_force(testdir, monkeypatch):
+    monkeypatch.delenv('DJANGO_SETTINGS_MODULE')
+    testdir.makeconftest("""
+        from django.conf import settings
+
+        def pytest_configure():
+            settings.configure(SECRET_KEY='set from pytest_configure',
+                               DEBUG=True,
+                               DATABASES={'default': {
+                                   'ENGINE': 'django.db.backends.sqlite3',
+                                   'NAME': ':memory:'}},
+                               INSTALLED_APPS=['django.contrib.auth',
+                                               'django.contrib.contenttypes',])
+    """)
+
+    testdir.makepyfile("""
+        from django.conf import settings
+        def test_debug_is_true():
+            assert settings.DEBUG is True
+    """)
+
+    r = testdir.runpytest('--no-force-no-debug')
+    assert r.ret == 0
+
+
 @pytest.mark.skipif(not hasattr(django, 'setup'),
                     reason="This Django version does not support app loading")
 @pytest.mark.django_project(extra_settings="""