diff --git a/.gitignore b/.gitignore
index ecb357f..80c5885 100644
--- a/.gitignore
+++ b/.gitignore
@@ -7,3 +7,5 @@ dist
 *~
 *.so
 .tox/
+# autogenerated from git tag by setuptools_scm
+src/zopfli/_version.py
diff --git a/setup.py b/setup.py
index a75c94a..da55837 100755
--- a/setup.py
+++ b/setup.py
@@ -59,7 +59,7 @@ def build_extensions(self):
 
 setup(
     name='zopfli',
-    version='0.1.8',
+    use_scm_version={"write_to": "src/zopfli/_version.py"},
     author='Adam DePrince',
     author_email='deprince@googlealumni.com',
     maintainer='Cosimo Lupo',
@@ -87,4 +87,5 @@ def build_extensions(self):
     cmdclass={
         "build_ext": custom_build_ext,
     },
+    setup_requires=["setuptools_scm"],
 )
diff --git a/src/zopfli/__init__.py b/src/zopfli/__init__.py
index 76e5050..2d0f843 100644
--- a/src/zopfli/__init__.py
+++ b/src/zopfli/__init__.py
@@ -24,3 +24,8 @@
   unlimited, but this can give extreme results that hurt compression
   on some files). Default value: 15.
 """
+
+try:
+    from ._version import version as __version__  # type: ignore
+except ImportError:
+    __version__ = "0.0.0+unknown"