diff --git a/scripts/install.in b/scripts/install.in
new file mode 100644
index 000000000..32cd24942
--- /dev/null
+++ b/scripts/install.in
@@ -0,0 +1,67 @@
+#!/bin/sh
+
+# This script installs the Nix package manager on your system by
+# downloading a binary distribution and running its installer script
+# (which in turn creates and populates /nix).
+
+{ # Prevent execution if this script was only partially downloaded
+oops() {
+    echo "$0:" "$@" >&2
+    exit 1
+}
+
+tmpDir="$(mktemp -d -t nix-binary-tarball-unpack.XXXXXXXXXX || \
+          oops "Can\'t create temporary directory for downloading the Nix binary tarball")"
+cleanup() {
+    rm -rf "$tmpDir"
+}
+trap cleanup EXIT INT QUIT TERM
+
+require_util() {
+    type "$1" > /dev/null 2>&1 || which "$1" > /dev/null 2>&1 ||
+        oops "you do not have '$1' installed, which I need to $2"
+}
+
+case "$(uname -s).$(uname -m)" in
+    Linux.x86_64) system=x86_64-linux; hash=[%nix_hash_x86_64_linux%];;
+    Linux.i?86) system=i686-linux; hash=[%nix_hash_i686_linux%];;
+    Linux.aarch64) system=aarch64-linux; hash=[%nix_hash_aarch64_linux%];;
+    Darwin.x86_64) system=x86_64-darwin; hash=[%nix_hash_x86_64_darwin%];;
+    *) oops "sorry, there is no binary distribution of Nix for your platform";;
+esac
+
+url="https://nixos.org/releases/nix/nix-[%latestNixVersion%]/nix-[%latestNixVersion%]-$system.tar.bz2"
+
+tarball="$tmpDir/$(basename "$tmpDir/nix-[%latestNixVersion%]-$system.tar.bz2")"
+
+require_util curl "download the binary tarball"
+require_util bzcat "decompress the binary tarball"
+require_util tar "unpack the binary tarball"
+
+echo "downloading Nix [%latestNixVersion%] binary tarball for $system from '$url' to '$tmpDir'..."
+curl -L "$url" -o "$tarball" || oops "failed to download '$url'"
+
+if type sha256sum > /dev/null 2>&1; then
+    hash2="$(sha256sum -b "$tarball" | cut -c1-64)"
+elif type shasum > /dev/null 2>&1; then
+    hash2="$(shasum -a 256 -b "$tarball" | cut -c1-64)"
+elif type openssl > /dev/null 2>&1; then
+    hash2="$(openssl dgst -r -sha256 "$tarball" | cut -c1-64)"
+else
+    oops "cannot verify the SHA-256 hash of '$url'; you need one of 'shasum', 'sha256sum', or 'openssl'"
+fi
+
+if [ "$hash" != "$hash2" ]; then
+    oops "SHA-256 hash mismatch in '$url'; expected $hash, got $hash2"
+fi
+
+unpack=$tmpDir/unpack
+mkdir -p "$unpack"
+< "$tarball" bzcat | tar -xf - -C "$unpack" || oops "failed to unpack '$url'"
+
+script=$(echo "$unpack"/*/install)
+
+[ -e "$script" ] || oops "installation script is missing from the binary tarball!"
+"$script" "$@"
+
+} # End of wrapping