diff --git a/INSTALL b/INSTALL
index e3d3ee0ff7..0059087c39 100644
--- a/INSTALL
+++ b/INSTALL
@@ -205,8 +205,9 @@ The following options allow you to tweak the generated code more precisely (see
     optimization of LyX. The compile may be much quicker with some
     compilers, but LyX will run more slowly.
 
-  o --disable-cxx11 forces the compiler in C++98 mode. The default is
-    to use C++11 mode for known good compilers.
+  o --disable-std-regex forces the compiler to use boost::regex. The default is
+    to use std::regex for known good C++ libraries, but the test is not robust for clang.
+    --enable-std-regex will force the use of std::regex.
 
   o --enable-debug will add debug information to your binary. This
     requires a lot more disk space, but is a must if you want to try
diff --git a/config/lyxinclude.m4 b/config/lyxinclude.m4
index 2d60cc1fe8..07153ec0e8 100644
--- a/config/lyxinclude.m4
+++ b/config/lyxinclude.m4
@@ -176,8 +176,10 @@ dnl the extra cxx11 flags have to be passed to the preprocessor. They are
 dnl not plainly added to AM_CPPFLAGS because then the objc compiler (mac)
 dnl would fail.
 AC_DEFUN([LYX_CXX_USE_REGEX],
-[lyx_std_regex=no
-   save_CPPFLAGS=$CPPFLAGS
+[AC_ARG_ENABLE(std-regex,
+  AC_HELP_STRING([--enable-std-regex],[use std::regex instead of boost::regex (default is autodetected)]),
+  [lyx_std_regex=$enableval],
+  [save_CPPFLAGS=$CPPFLAGS
    # we want to pass -std=c++11 to clang/cpp if necessary
    CPPFLAGS="$AM_CPPFLAGS $1 $CPPFLAGS"
    save_CXXFLAGS=$CXXFLAGS
@@ -197,8 +199,8 @@ AC_DEFUN([LYX_CXX_USE_REGEX],
          *) ;;
        esac
      fi
-   fi
-   AC_MSG_RESULT([$lyx_std_regex])
+     AC_MSG_RESULT([$lyx_std_regex])
+   fi])
 
  if test $lyx_std_regex = yes ; then
   lyx_flags="$lyx_flags std-regex"
@@ -367,7 +369,7 @@ if test x$GXX = xyes; then
                 [cxx11_flags="-std=gnu++11"],
                 [cxx11_flags="-std=c++11"]);;
     esac
-    # cxx11_flags is useful when running preprocessor alone 
+    # cxx11_flags is useful when running preprocessor alone
     # (see detection of regex).
     AM_CXXFLAGS="$cxx11_flags $AM_CXXFLAGS"
 fi