diff --git a/share/rpcauth/README.md b/share/rpcauth/README.md
index 389278a12..20d16f0a9 100644
--- a/share/rpcauth/README.md
+++ b/share/rpcauth/README.md
@@ -1,10 +1,14 @@
 RPC Tools
 ---------------------
 
 ### [RPCAuth](/share/rpcauth) ###
 
 Create login credentials for a JSON-RPC user.
 
 Usage:
 
     ./rpcauth.py <username>
+
+in which case the script will generate a password. To specify a custom password do:
+
+    ./rpcauth.py <username> <password>
diff --git a/share/rpcauth/rpcauth.py b/share/rpcauth/rpcauth.py
index 3de868718..d33aa0730 100755
--- a/share/rpcauth/rpcauth.py
+++ b/share/rpcauth/rpcauth.py
@@ -1,49 +1,54 @@
 #!/usr/bin/env python3
 # Copyright (c) 2015-2017 The Bitcoin Core developers
 # Distributed under the MIT software license, see the accompanying
 # file COPYING or http://www.opensource.org/licenses/mit-license.php.
 
 import base64
 import hmac
 import os
 from random import SystemRandom
 import sys
 
 
 def generate_salt():
     # This uses os.urandom() underneath
     cryptogen = SystemRandom()
 
     # Create 16 byte hex salt
     salt_sequence = [cryptogen.randrange(256) for _ in range(16)]
     return ''.join([format(r, 'x') for r in salt_sequence])
 
 
-def generate_password(salt):
+def generate_password():
     """Create 32 byte b64 password"""
-    password = base64.urlsafe_b64encode(os.urandom(32)).decode('utf-8')
+    return base64.urlsafe_b64encode(os.urandom(32)).decode('utf-8')
 
+
+def password_to_hmac(salt, password):
     m = hmac.new(bytearray(salt, 'utf-8'),
                  bytearray(password, 'utf-8'), 'SHA256')
-    password_hmac = m.hexdigest()
-
-    return password, password_hmac
+    return m.hexdigest()
 
 
 def main():
     if len(sys.argv) < 2:
-        sys.stderr.write('Please include username as an argument.\n')
+        sys.stderr.write(
+            'Please include username (and an optional password, will generate one if not provided) as an argument.\n')
         sys.exit(0)
 
     username = sys.argv[1]
 
     salt = generate_salt()
-    password, password_hmac = generate_password(salt)
+    if len(sys.argv) > 2:
+        password = sys.argv[2]
+    else:
+        password = generate_password()
+    password_hmac = password_to_hmac(salt, password)
 
     print('String to be appended to bitcoin.conf:')
     print('rpcauth={0}:{1}${2}'.format(username, salt, password_hmac))
     print('Your password:\n{0}'.format(password))
 
 
 if __name__ == '__main__':
     main()
diff --git a/test/util/rpcauth-test.py b/test/util/rpcauth-test.py
index c14c16ca4..4253dc97d 100755
--- a/test/util/rpcauth-test.py
+++ b/test/util/rpcauth-test.py
@@ -1,51 +1,50 @@
 #!/usr/bin/env python3
 # Copyright (c) 2015-2018 The Bitcoin Core developers
 # Distributed under the MIT software license, see the accompanying
 # file COPYING or http://www.opensource.org/licenses/mit-license.php.
 """Test share/rpcauth/rpcauth.py
 """
 import base64
 import configparser
 import hmac
 import importlib
 import os
 import sys
 import unittest
 
 
 class TestRPCAuth(unittest.TestCase):
     def setUp(self):
         config = configparser.ConfigParser()
         config_path = os.path.abspath(
             os.path.join(os.sep, os.path.abspath(os.path.dirname(__file__)),
                          "../config.ini"))
         with open(config_path, encoding="utf8") as config_file:
             config.read_file(config_file)
         sys.path.insert(0, os.path.dirname(config['environment']['RPCAUTH']))
         self.rpcauth = importlib.import_module('rpcauth')
 
     def test_generate_salt(self):
         self.assertLessEqual(len(self.rpcauth.generate_salt()), 32)
         self.assertGreaterEqual(len(self.rpcauth.generate_salt()), 16)
 
     def test_generate_password(self):
-        salt = self.rpcauth.generate_salt()
-        password, password_hmac = self.rpcauth.generate_password(salt)
-
+        password = self.rpcauth.generate_password()
         expected_password = base64.urlsafe_b64encode(
             base64.urlsafe_b64decode(password)).decode('utf-8')
         self.assertEqual(expected_password, password)
 
     def test_check_password_hmac(self):
         salt = self.rpcauth.generate_salt()
-        password, password_hmac = self.rpcauth.generate_password(salt)
+        password = self.rpcauth.generate_password()
+        password_hmac = self.rpcauth.password_to_hmac(salt, password)
 
         m = hmac.new(bytearray(salt, 'utf-8'),
                      bytearray(password, 'utf-8'), 'SHA256')
         expected_password_hmac = m.hexdigest()
 
         self.assertEqual(expected_password_hmac, password_hmac)
 
 
 if __name__ == '__main__':
     unittest.main()