diff --git a/builtin/fetch.c b/builtin/fetch.c
index d39098d9ab..acc4e89bc9 100644
--- a/builtin/fetch.c
+++ b/builtin/fetch.c
@@ -1626,9 +1626,21 @@ static int do_fetch(struct transport *transport,
 				break;
 			}
 		}
-	} else if (transport->remote->fetch.nr)
-		refspec_ref_prefixes(&transport->remote->fetch,
-				     &transport_ls_refs_options.ref_prefixes);
+	} else {
+		struct branch *branch = branch_get(NULL);
+
+		if (transport->remote->fetch.nr)
+			refspec_ref_prefixes(&transport->remote->fetch,
+					     &transport_ls_refs_options.ref_prefixes);
+		if (branch_has_merge_config(branch) &&
+		    !strcmp(branch->remote_name, transport->remote->name)) {
+			int i;
+			for (i = 0; i < branch->merge_nr; i++) {
+				strvec_push(&transport_ls_refs_options.ref_prefixes,
+					    branch->merge[i]->src);
+			}
+		}
+	}
 
 	if (tags == TAGS_SET || tags == TAGS_DEFAULT) {
 		must_list_refs = 1;
diff --git a/t/t5520-pull.sh b/t/t5520-pull.sh
index 081808009b..0b72112fb1 100755
--- a/t/t5520-pull.sh
+++ b/t/t5520-pull.sh
@@ -218,6 +218,23 @@ test_expect_success 'fail if upstream branch does not exist' '
 	test_cmp expect file
 '
 
+test_expect_success 'fetch upstream branch even if refspec excludes it' '
+	# the branch names are not important here except that
+	# the first one must not be a prefix of the second,
+	# since otherwise the ref-prefix protocol extension
+	# would match both
+	git branch in-refspec HEAD^ &&
+	git branch not-in-refspec HEAD &&
+	git init -b in-refspec downstream &&
+	git -C downstream remote add -t in-refspec origin "file://$(pwd)/.git" &&
+	git -C downstream config branch.in-refspec.remote origin &&
+	git -C downstream config branch.in-refspec.merge refs/heads/not-in-refspec &&
+	git -C downstream pull &&
+	git rev-parse --verify not-in-refspec >expect &&
+	git -C downstream rev-parse --verify HEAD >actual &&
+	test_cmp expect actual
+'
+
 test_expect_success 'fail if the index has unresolved entries' '
 	git checkout -b third second^ &&
 	test_when_finished "git checkout -f copy && git branch -D third" &&