diff --git a/packages/bazel/src/builders/bazel.ts b/packages/bazel/src/builders/bazel.ts
index a9f143e453..e2dd5cb82f 100644
--- a/packages/bazel/src/builders/bazel.ts
+++ b/packages/bazel/src/builders/bazel.ts
@@ -10,6 +10,7 @@
 
 import {spawn} from 'child_process';
 import {copyFileSync, existsSync, readFileSync, readdirSync, statSync, unlinkSync, writeFileSync} from 'fs';
+import {platform} from 'os';
 import {dirname, join, normalize} from 'path';
 
 export type Executable = 'bazel' | 'ibazel';
@@ -133,6 +134,24 @@ function replaceYarnWithNpm(source: string, dest: string) {
   writeFileSync(dest, destContent);
 }
 
+/**
+ * Disable sandbox on Mac OS by setting spawn_strategy in .bazelrc.
+ * For a hello world (ng new) application, removing the sandbox improves build
+ * time by almost 40%.
+ * ng build with sandbox: 22.0 seconds
+ * ng build without sandbox: 13.3 seconds
+ */
+function disableSandbox(source: string, dest: string) {
+  const srcContent = readFileSync(source, 'utf-8');
+  const destContent = `${srcContent}
+# Disable sandbox on Mac OS for performance reason.
+build --spawn_strategy=local
+run --spawn_strategy=local
+test --spawn_strategy=local
+`;
+  writeFileSync(dest, destContent);
+}
+
 /**
  * Copy Bazel files (WORKSPACE, BUILD.bazel, etc) from the template directory to
  * the project `root` directory, and return the absolute paths of the files
@@ -154,6 +173,8 @@ export function copyBazelFiles(root: string, templateDir: string) {
       if (!existsSync(dest)) {
         if (!useYarn && name === 'WORKSPACE') {
           replaceYarnWithNpm(source, dest);
+        } else if (platform() === 'darwin' && name === '.bazelrc') {
+          disableSandbox(source, dest);
         } else {
           copyFileSync(source, dest);
         }