diff --git a/modules/elasticsearch/src/main/java/org/elasticsearch/http/netty/NettyHttpServerTransport.java b/modules/elasticsearch/src/main/java/org/elasticsearch/http/netty/NettyHttpServerTransport.java
index 603032cf34a..400142e8a77 100644
--- a/modules/elasticsearch/src/main/java/org/elasticsearch/http/netty/NettyHttpServerTransport.java
+++ b/modules/elasticsearch/src/main/java/org/elasticsearch/http/netty/NettyHttpServerTransport.java
@@ -24,6 +24,7 @@ import org.elasticsearch.ElasticSearchException;
 import org.elasticsearch.http.*;
 import org.elasticsearch.threadpool.ThreadPool;
 import org.elasticsearch.transport.BindTransportException;
+import org.elasticsearch.util.SizeUnit;
 import org.elasticsearch.util.SizeValue;
 import org.elasticsearch.util.TimeValue;
 import org.elasticsearch.util.component.AbstractComponent;
@@ -36,6 +37,7 @@ import org.elasticsearch.util.transport.PortsRange;
 import org.jboss.netty.bootstrap.ServerBootstrap;
 import org.jboss.netty.channel.*;
 import org.jboss.netty.channel.socket.nio.NioServerSocketChannelFactory;
+import org.jboss.netty.handler.codec.http.HttpChunkAggregator;
 import org.jboss.netty.handler.codec.http.HttpRequestDecoder;
 import org.jboss.netty.handler.codec.http.HttpResponseEncoder;
 import org.jboss.netty.handler.timeout.ReadTimeoutException;
@@ -73,6 +75,8 @@ public class NettyHttpServerTransport extends AbstractComponent implements HttpS
 
     private final ThreadPool threadPool;
 
+    private final SizeValue maxContentLength;
+
     private final int workerCount;
 
     private final String port;
@@ -108,6 +112,7 @@ public class NettyHttpServerTransport extends AbstractComponent implements HttpS
     @Inject public NettyHttpServerTransport(Settings settings, ThreadPool threadPool) {
         super(settings);
         this.threadPool = threadPool;
+        SizeValue maxContentLength = componentSettings.getAsSize("maxContentLength", new SizeValue(100, SizeUnit.MB));
         this.workerCount = componentSettings.getAsInt("workerCount", Runtime.getRuntime().availableProcessors());
         this.port = componentSettings.get("port", "9200-9300");
         this.bindHost = componentSettings.get("bindHost");
@@ -123,6 +128,13 @@ public class NettyHttpServerTransport extends AbstractComponent implements HttpS
         if ((httpKeepAliveTickDuration.millis() * 10) > httpKeepAlive.millis()) {
             logger.warn("Suspicious keep alive settings, httpKeepAlive set to [{}], while httpKeepAliveTickDuration is set to [{}]", httpKeepAlive, httpKeepAliveTickDuration);
         }
+
+        // validate max content length
+        if (maxContentLength.bytes() > Integer.MAX_VALUE) {
+            logger.warn("maxContentLength[" + maxContentLength + "] set to high value, resetting it to [100mb]");
+            maxContentLength = new SizeValue(100, SizeUnit.MB);
+        }
+        this.maxContentLength = maxContentLength;
     }
 
     @Override public Lifecycle.State lifecycleState() {
@@ -154,6 +166,7 @@ public class NettyHttpServerTransport extends AbstractComponent implements HttpS
                 pipeline.addLast("openChannels", serverOpenChannels);
                 pipeline.addLast("keepAliveTimeout", new ReadTimeoutHandler(keepAliveTimer, httpKeepAlive.millis(), TimeUnit.MILLISECONDS));
                 pipeline.addLast("decoder", new HttpRequestDecoder());
+                pipeline.addLast("aggregator", new HttpChunkAggregator((int) maxContentLength.bytes()));
                 pipeline.addLast("encoder", new HttpResponseEncoder());
                 pipeline.addLast("handler", requestHandler);
                 return pipeline;
diff --git a/modules/elasticsearch/src/main/java/org/elasticsearch/http/netty/SimpleNettyHttpTransportTests.java b/modules/elasticsearch/src/main/java/org/elasticsearch/http/netty/SimpleNettyHttpTransportTests.java
deleted file mode 100644
index bbd08273a59..00000000000
--- a/modules/elasticsearch/src/main/java/org/elasticsearch/http/netty/SimpleNettyHttpTransportTests.java
+++ /dev/null
@@ -1,24 +0,0 @@
-/*
- * Licensed to Elastic Search and Shay Banon under one
- * or more contributor license agreements.  See the NOTICE file
- * distributed with this work for additional information
- * regarding copyright ownership. Elastic Search licenses this
- * file to you under the Apache License, Version 2.0 (the
- * "License"); you may not use this file except in compliance
- * with the License.  You may obtain a copy of the License at
- *
- *    http://www.apache.org/licenses/LICENSE-2.0
- *
- * Unless required by applicable law or agreed to in writing,
- * software distributed under the License is distributed on an
- * "AS IS" BASIS, WITHOUT WARRANTIES OR CONDITIONS OF ANY
- * KIND, either express or implied.  See the License for the
- * specific language governing permissions and limitations
- * under the License.
- */
-
-package org.elasticsearch.http.netty;
-
-public class SimpleNettyHttpTransportTests {
-
-}
\ No newline at end of file