diff --git a/Cargo.lock b/Cargo.lock
index 32675afdb..a65ae9fe0 100644
--- a/Cargo.lock
+++ b/Cargo.lock
@@ -1426,6 +1426,7 @@ dependencies = [
  "tokio-tar",
  "tokio-util",
  "toml",
+ "tracing-subscriber",
  "url",
  "uuid",
 ]
diff --git a/Cargo.toml b/Cargo.toml
index fd2ee01b1..e6b8085f6 100644
--- a/Cargo.toml
+++ b/Cargo.toml
@@ -104,6 +104,7 @@ tokio-util = "0.7.9"
 toml = "0.8"
 url = "2"
 uuid = { version = "1", features = ["serde", "v4"] }
+tracing-subscriber = { version = "0.3", features = ["env-filter"] }
 
 # Pin OpenSSL to 3.1 releases.
 # OpenSSL 3.2 has a regression tracked at <https://github.com/openssl/openssl/issues/23376>
@@ -113,6 +114,7 @@ uuid = { version = "1", features = ["serde", "v4"] }
 # 3.1 branch will be supported until 2025-03-14.
 openssl-src = "~300.1"
 
+
 [dev-dependencies]
 ansi_term = "0.12.0"
 anyhow = { version = "1", features = ["backtrace"] } # Enable `backtrace` feature in tests.
@@ -181,4 +183,4 @@ vendored = [
   "async-native-tls/vendored",
   "rusqlite/bundled-sqlcipher-vendored-openssl",
   "reqwest/native-tls-vendored"
-]
\ No newline at end of file
+]
diff --git a/src/context.rs b/src/context.rs
index b4e5e50e5..46c8c7766 100644
--- a/src/context.rs
+++ b/src/context.rs
@@ -13,6 +13,7 @@ use async_channel::{self as channel, Receiver, Sender};
 use pgp::SignedPublicKey;
 use ratelimit::Ratelimit;
 use tokio::sync::{Mutex, Notify, OnceCell, RwLock};
+use tracing_subscriber::{prelude::*, EnvFilter};
 
 use crate::aheader::EncryptPreference;
 use crate::chat::{get_chat_cnt, ChatId, ProtectionStatus};
@@ -337,6 +338,13 @@ impl Context {
         events: Events,
         stock_strings: StockStrings,
     ) -> Result<Context> {
+        // set the RUST_LOG env var to one of {debug,info,warn} to see logging info
+        tracing_subscriber::registry()
+            .with(tracing_subscriber::fmt::layer().with_writer(std::io::stderr))
+            .with(EnvFilter::from_default_env())
+            .try_init()
+            .ok();
+
         let context =
             Self::new_closed(dbfile, id, events, stock_strings, Default::default()).await?;