diff --git a/docs/docsite/rst/user_guide/playbooks_filters.rst b/docs/docsite/rst/user_guide/playbooks_filters.rst
index e28bfce0d39..5831d8a2708 100644
--- a/docs/docsite/rst/user_guide/playbooks_filters.rst
+++ b/docs/docsite/rst/user_guide/playbooks_filters.rst
@@ -895,6 +895,14 @@ To expand a path containing a tilde (`~`) character (new in version 1.5)::
 
     {{ path | expanduser }}
 
+To expand a path containing environment variables::
+
+    {{ path | expandvars }}
+
+.. note:: `expandvars` expands local variables; using it on remote paths can lead to errors.
+
+.. versionadded:: 2.6
+
 To get the real path of a link (new in version 1.8)::
 
     {{ path | realpath }}
diff --git a/lib/ansible/plugins/filter/core.py b/lib/ansible/plugins/filter/core.py
index d8a43016a89..6b39f2fbe1d 100644
--- a/lib/ansible/plugins/filter/core.py
+++ b/lib/ansible/plugins/filter/core.py
@@ -530,6 +530,7 @@ class FilterModule(object):
             'basename': partial(unicode_wrap, os.path.basename),
             'dirname': partial(unicode_wrap, os.path.dirname),
             'expanduser': partial(unicode_wrap, os.path.expanduser),
+            'expandvars': partial(unicode_wrap, os.path.expandvars),
             'realpath': partial(unicode_wrap, os.path.realpath),
             'relpath': partial(unicode_wrap, os.path.relpath),
             'splitext': partial(unicode_wrap, os.path.splitext),