diff --git a/tools/virsh-volume.c b/tools/virsh-volume.c
index 96b4a7b1663d64509f88829434448271a733ff82..02ed044e41ec27ff7bf0d310ced650662386b1de 100644
--- a/tools/virsh-volume.c
+++ b/tools/virsh-volume.c
@@ -996,6 +996,10 @@ static const vshCmdOptDef opts_vol_info[] = {
      .type = VSH_OT_BOOL,
      .help = N_("sizes are represented in bytes rather than pretty units")
     },
+    {.name = "physical",
+     .type = VSH_OT_BOOL,
+     .help = N_("return the physical size of the volume in allocation field")
+    },
     {.name = NULL}
 };
 
@@ -1005,14 +1009,25 @@ cmdVolInfo(vshControl *ctl, const vshCmd *cmd)
     virStorageVolInfo info;
     virStorageVolPtr vol;
     bool bytes = vshCommandOptBool(cmd, "bytes");
+    bool physical = vshCommandOptBool(cmd, "physical");
     bool ret = true;
+    int rc;
+    unsigned int flags = 0;
 
     if (!(vol = virshCommandOptVol(ctl, cmd, "vol", "pool", NULL)))
         return false;
 
     vshPrint(ctl, "%-15s %s\n", _("Name:"), virStorageVolGetName(vol));
 
-    if (virStorageVolGetInfo(vol, &info) == 0) {
+    if (physical)
+        flags |= VIR_STORAGE_VOL_GET_PHYSICAL;
+
+    if (flags)
+        rc = virStorageVolGetInfoFlags(vol, &info, flags);
+    else
+        rc = virStorageVolGetInfo(vol, &info);
+
+    if (rc == 0) {
         double val;
         const char *unit;
 
@@ -1028,11 +1043,18 @@ cmdVolInfo(vshControl *ctl, const vshCmd *cmd)
         }
 
         if (bytes) {
-            vshPrint(ctl, "%-15s %llu %s\n", _("Allocation:"),
-                     info.allocation, _("bytes"));
+            if (physical)
+                vshPrint(ctl, "%-15s %llu %s\n", _("Physical:"),
+                         info.allocation, _("bytes"));
+            else
+                vshPrint(ctl, "%-15s %llu %s\n", _("Allocation:"),
+                         info.allocation, _("bytes"));
          } else {
             val = vshPrettyCapacity(info.allocation, &unit);
-            vshPrint(ctl, "%-15s %2.2lf %s\n", _("Allocation:"), val, unit);
+            if (physical)
+                vshPrint(ctl, "%-15s %2.2lf %s\n", _("Physical:"), val, unit);
+            else
+                vshPrint(ctl, "%-15s %2.2lf %s\n", _("Allocation:"), val, unit);
          }
     } else {
         ret = false;
diff --git a/tools/virsh.pod b/tools/virsh.pod
index 940c64611c5d679cbdb163770756c8c5e1336b63..ef9122379321efd0a21b65c38497ff3ba2156db9 100644
--- a/tools/virsh.pod
+++ b/tools/virsh.pod
@@ -3879,13 +3879,17 @@ is in. I<vol-name-or-key-or-path> is the name or key or path of the volume
 to output the XML of.
 
 =item B<vol-info> [I<--pool> I<pool-or-uuid>] I<vol-name-or-key-or-path>
-[I<--bytes>]
+[I<--bytes>] [I<--physical>]
 
 Returns basic information about the given storage volume.
 I<--pool> I<pool-or-uuid> is the name or UUID of the storage pool the volume
 is in. I<vol-name-or-key-or-path> is the name or key or path of the volume
 to return information for. If I<--bytes> is specified the sizes are not
-converted to human friendly units.
+converted to human friendly units. If I<--physical> is specified, then the host
+physical size is returned and displayed instead of the allocation value. The
+physical value for some file types, such as qcow2 may have a different (larger)
+physical value than is shown for allocation. Additionally sparse files will
+have different physical and allocation values.
 
 =item B<vol-list> [I<--pool> I<pool-or-uuid>] [I<--details>]