diff --git a/website/docs/backends/types/s3.html.md b/website/docs/backends/types/s3.html.md
index 893fb11a8..13049c2c3 100644
--- a/website/docs/backends/types/s3.html.md
+++ b/website/docs/backends/types/s3.html.md
@@ -38,6 +38,35 @@ Terraform state is written to the key `path/to/my/key`.
 Note that for the access credentials we recommend using a
 [partial configuration](/docs/backends/config.html).
 
+### S3 Bucket Permissions
+
+Terraform will need the following AWS IAM permissions on
+the target backend bucket:
+
+* `s3:ListBucket` on `arn:aws:s3:::mybucket`
+* `s3:GetObject` on `arn:aws:s3:::mybucket/path/to/my/key`
+* `s3:PutObject` on `arn:aws:s3:::mybucket/path/to/my/key`
+
+This is seen in the following AWS IAM Statement:
+
+```json
+{
+  "Version": "2012-10-17",
+  "Statement": [
+    {
+      "Effect": "Allow",
+      "Action": "s3:ListBucket",
+      "Resource": "arn:aws:s3:::mybucket"
+    },
+    {
+      "Effect": "Allow",
+      "Action": ["s3:GetObject", "s3:PutObject"],
+      "Resource": "arn:aws:s3:::mybucket/path/to/my/key"
+    }
+  ]
+}
+```
+
 ## Using the S3 remote state
 
 To make use of the S3 remote state we can use the