diff --git a/CMakeLists.txt b/CMakeLists.txt
index 115ccb7ee1..5d1ae19a8a 100644
--- a/CMakeLists.txt
+++ b/CMakeLists.txt
@@ -16,6 +16,8 @@ option(ENABLE_JAVA "Compile Java projects, requires a JDK and the JAVA_HOME env
 
 option(USE_EXTERNAL_GLES3 "Experimental: Compile Filament against OpenGL ES 3" OFF)
 
+option(GENERATE_WEB_DOCS "Build WebGL documentation and tutorials" OFF)
+
 # ==================================================================================================
 # OS specific
 # ==================================================================================================
@@ -370,7 +372,10 @@ set (FILAMENT_SAMPLES_BINARY_DIR ${PROJECT_BINARY_DIR}/samples)
 if (WEBGL)
     add_subdirectory(web/filament-js)
     add_subdirectory(web/samples)
-    add_subdirectory(web/docs)
+
+    if (GENERATE_WEB_DOCS)
+        add_subdirectory(web/docs)
+    endif()
 
     add_subdirectory(${EXTERNAL}/imgui/tnt)
     add_subdirectory(${EXTERNAL}/stb/tnt)
diff --git a/build.sh b/build.sh
index 2a98a51279..2d3bbba921 100755
--- a/build.sh
+++ b/build.sh
@@ -94,6 +94,8 @@ ISSUE_CMAKE_ALWAYS=false
 
 RUN_TESTS=false
 
+WEB_DOCS_OPTION="-DGENERATE_WEB_DOCS=OFF"
+
 ENABLE_JAVA=ON
 
 INSTALL_COMMAND=
@@ -231,6 +233,7 @@ function build_webgl_with_target {
             -DCMAKE_BUILD_TYPE=$1 \
             -DCMAKE_INSTALL_PREFIX=../webgl-${LC_TARGET}/filament \
             -DWEBGL=1 \
+            $WEB_DOCS_OPTION \
             ../..
         ${BUILD_COMMAND} ${BUILD_TARGETS}
         )
@@ -587,6 +590,7 @@ while getopts ":hacfijmp:tuvsl" opt; do
         a)
             ISSUE_ARCHIVES=true
             INSTALL_COMMAND=install
+            WEB_DOCS_OPTION="-DGENERATE_WEB_DOCS=ON"
             ;;
         c)
             ISSUE_CLEAN=true
diff --git a/web/docs/build.py b/web/docs/build.py
index a9396844cf..08a4089470 100755
--- a/web/docs/build.py
+++ b/web/docs/build.py
@@ -4,6 +4,9 @@
 # To run this script, you may need to do the following on Ubuntu:
 #     sudo apt-get install python3-pip
 #     pip3 install -r requirements.txt
+#
+# If CMake is choosing /usr/bin/python3, then do this instead:
+#     /usr/bin/python3 -m pip requirements.txt
 
 """Converts markdown into HTML and extracts JavaScript code blocks.