diff --git a/pkgs/development/interpreters/python/cpython/default.nix b/pkgs/development/interpreters/python/cpython/default.nix
index 32aa355d3aa..09c324716bd 100644
--- a/pkgs/development/interpreters/python/cpython/default.nix
+++ b/pkgs/development/interpreters/python/cpython/default.nix
@@ -100,7 +100,7 @@ in with passthru; stdenv.mkDerivation {
   ] ++ optionals isPy35 [
     # Backports support for LD_LIBRARY_PATH from 3.6
     ./3.5/ld_library_path.patch
-  ] ++ optionals isPy37 [
+  ] ++ optionals (isPy37 || isPy38) [
     # Fix darwin build https://bugs.python.org/issue34027
     (fetchpatch {
       url = https://bugs.python.org/file47666/darwin-libutil.patch;
@@ -114,7 +114,7 @@ in with passthru; stdenv.mkDerivation {
     (
       if isPy35 then
         ./3.5/python-3.x-distutils-C++.patch
-      else if isPy37 then
+      else if isPy37 || isPy38 then
         ./3.7/python-3.x-distutils-C++.patch
       else
         fetchpatch {
diff --git a/pkgs/development/interpreters/python/default.nix b/pkgs/development/interpreters/python/default.nix
index 4c207ea067a..43a3125d8a0 100644
--- a/pkgs/development/interpreters/python/default.nix
+++ b/pkgs/development/interpreters/python/default.nix
@@ -28,6 +28,7 @@ with pkgs;
         isPy35 = pythonVersion == "3.5";
         isPy36 = pythonVersion == "3.6";
         isPy37 = pythonVersion == "3.7";
+        isPy38 = pythonVersion == "3.8";
         isPy2 = lib.strings.substring 0 1 pythonVersion == "2";
         isPy3 = lib.strings.substring 0 1 pythonVersion == "3";
         isPy3k = isPy3;