diff --git a/meson.build b/meson.build
index 410bbf93da..939a2eae32 100644
--- a/meson.build
+++ b/meson.build
@@ -70,9 +70,15 @@
 #      # Execute single test interactively such that features like `debug ()` work.
 #      $ meson test -i --test-args='-ix' t1400-update-ref
 #
-#   Test execution is parallelized by default and scales with the number of
-#   processor cores available. You can change the number of processes by passing
-#   the `-jN` flag to `meson test`.
+#      # Execute all benchmarks.
+#      $ meson test -i --benchmark
+#
+#      # Execute single benchmark.
+#      $ meson test -i --benchmark p0000-*
+#
+#   Test execution (but not benchmark execution) is parallelized by default and
+#   scales with the number of processor cores available. You can change the
+#   number of processes by passing the `-jN` flag to `meson test`.
 #
 # 4. Install the Git distribution. Again, this can be done via Meson, Ninja or
 #    Samurai:
@@ -235,6 +241,7 @@ git = find_program('git', dirs: program_path, native: true, required: false)
 sed = find_program('sed', dirs: program_path, native: true)
 shell = find_program('sh', dirs: program_path, native: true)
 tar = find_program('tar', dirs: program_path, native: true)
+time = find_program('time', dirs: program_path, required: get_option('benchmarks'))
 
 target_shell = find_program('sh', dirs: program_path, native: false)
 
@@ -836,7 +843,7 @@ endif
 # features. It is optional if you want to neither execute tests nor use any of
 # these optional features.
 perl_required = get_option('perl')
-if get_option('gitweb').enabled() or 'netrc' in get_option('credential_helpers') or get_option('docs') != []
+if get_option('benchmarks').enabled() or get_option('gitweb').enabled() or 'netrc' in get_option('credential_helpers') or get_option('docs') != []
   perl_required = true
 endif
 
@@ -2082,6 +2089,7 @@ meson.add_dist_script(
 )
 
 summary({
+  'benchmarks': get_option('tests') and perl.found() and time.found(),
   'curl': curl.found(),
   'expat': expat.found(),
   'gettext': intl.found(),
diff --git a/meson_options.txt b/meson_options.txt
index 8ac30a5223..7f5bca5c02 100644
--- a/meson_options.txt
+++ b/meson_options.txt
@@ -101,6 +101,8 @@ option('docs_backend', type: 'combo', choices: ['asciidoc', 'asciidoctor', 'auto
   description: 'Which backend to use to generate documentation.')
 
 # Testing.
+option('benchmarks', type: 'feature', value: 'auto',
+  description: 'Enable benchmarks. This requires Perl and GNU time.')
 option('coccinelle', type: 'feature', value: 'auto',
   description: 'Provide a coccicheck target that generates a Coccinelle patch.')
 option('tests', type: 'boolean', value: true,
diff --git a/t/meson.build b/t/meson.build
index bfb744e886..59438b0626 100644
--- a/t/meson.build
+++ b/t/meson.build
@@ -1097,11 +1097,71 @@ integration_tests = [
   't9903-bash-prompt.sh',
 ]
 
+benchmarks = [
+  'perf/p0000-perf-lib-sanity.sh',
+  'perf/p0001-rev-list.sh',
+  'perf/p0002-read-cache.sh',
+  'perf/p0003-delta-base-cache.sh',
+  'perf/p0004-lazy-init-name-hash.sh',
+  'perf/p0005-status.sh',
+  'perf/p0006-read-tree-checkout.sh',
+  'perf/p0007-write-cache.sh',
+  'perf/p0008-odb-fsync.sh',
+  'perf/p0071-sort.sh',
+  'perf/p0090-cache-tree.sh',
+  'perf/p0100-globbing.sh',
+  'perf/p1006-cat-file.sh',
+  'perf/p1400-update-ref.sh',
+  'perf/p1450-fsck.sh',
+  'perf/p1451-fsck-skip-list.sh',
+  'perf/p1500-graph-walks.sh',
+  'perf/p2000-sparse-operations.sh',
+  'perf/p3400-rebase.sh',
+  'perf/p3404-rebase-interactive.sh',
+  'perf/p4000-diff-algorithms.sh',
+  'perf/p4001-diff-no-index.sh',
+  'perf/p4002-diff-color-moved.sh',
+  'perf/p4205-log-pretty-formats.sh',
+  'perf/p4209-pickaxe.sh',
+  'perf/p4211-line-log.sh',
+  'perf/p4220-log-grep-engines.sh',
+  'perf/p4221-log-grep-engines-fixed.sh',
+  'perf/p5302-pack-index.sh',
+  'perf/p5303-many-packs.sh',
+  'perf/p5304-prune.sh',
+  'perf/p5310-pack-bitmaps.sh',
+  'perf/p5311-pack-bitmaps-fetch.sh',
+  'perf/p5312-pack-bitmaps-revs.sh',
+  'perf/p5313-pack-objects.sh',
+  'perf/p5314-name-hash.sh',
+  'perf/p5326-multi-pack-bitmaps.sh',
+  'perf/p5332-multi-pack-reuse.sh',
+  'perf/p5333-pseudo-merge-bitmaps.sh',
+  'perf/p5550-fetch-tags.sh',
+  'perf/p5551-fetch-rescan.sh',
+  'perf/p5600-partial-clone.sh',
+  'perf/p5601-clone-reference.sh',
+  'perf/p6100-describe.sh',
+  'perf/p6300-for-each-ref.sh',
+  'perf/p7000-filter-branch.sh',
+  'perf/p7102-reset.sh',
+  'perf/p7300-clean.sh',
+  'perf/p7519-fsmonitor.sh',
+  'perf/p7527-builtin-fsmonitor.sh',
+  'perf/p7810-grep.sh',
+  'perf/p7820-grep-engines.sh',
+  'perf/p7821-grep-engines-fixed.sh',
+  'perf/p7822-grep-perl-character.sh',
+  'perf/p9210-scalar.sh',
+  'perf/p9300-fast-import-export.sh',
+]
+
 # Sanity check that we are not missing any tests present in 't/'. This check
 # only runs once at configure time and is thus best-effort, only. It is
 # sufficient to catch missing test suites in our CI though.
 foreach glob, tests : {
   't[0-9][0-9][0-9][0-9]-*.sh': integration_tests,
+  'perf/p[0-9][0-9][0-9][0-9]-*.sh': benchmarks,
   'unit-tests/t-*.c': unit_test_programs,
   'unit-tests/u-*.c': clar_test_suites,
 }
@@ -1153,3 +1213,20 @@ foreach integration_test : integration_tests
     timeout: 0,
   )
 endforeach
+
+if perl.found() and time.found()
+  benchmark_environment = test_environment
+  benchmark_environment.set('GTIME', time.full_path())
+
+  foreach benchmark : benchmarks
+    benchmark(fs.stem(benchmark), shell,
+      args: [
+        fs.name(benchmark),
+      ],
+      workdir: meson.current_source_dir() / 'perf',
+      env: benchmark_environment,
+      depends: test_dependencies + bin_wrappers,
+      timeout: 0,
+    )
+  endforeach
+endif