diff --git a/CHANGELOG.md b/CHANGELOG.md
index 2d1aff7f4..a4f54fa04 100644
--- a/CHANGELOG.md
+++ b/CHANGELOG.md
@@ -18,6 +18,7 @@ and this project adheres to
 - 🚩 add homepage feature flag #861
 - ✨(settings) Allow configuring PKCE for the SSO #886
 - 🌐(i18n) activate chinese and spanish languages #884
+- 🔧(backend) allow overwriting the data directory #893
 
 ## Changed
 
diff --git a/src/backend/impress/settings.py b/src/backend/impress/settings.py
index a01bc0021..3fc497b71 100755
--- a/src/backend/impress/settings.py
+++ b/src/backend/impress/settings.py
@@ -23,7 +23,7 @@
 
 # Build paths inside the project like this: BASE_DIR / 'subdir'.
 BASE_DIR = os.path.dirname(os.path.dirname(os.path.abspath(__file__)))
-DATA_DIR = os.path.join("/", "data")
+DATA_DIR = os.getenv("DATA_DIR", os.path.join("/", "data"))
 
 
 def get_release():