diff --git a/_pytest/python.py b/_pytest/python.py
index ec346f587..3d458ed82 100644
--- a/_pytest/python.py
+++ b/_pytest/python.py
@@ -261,7 +261,8 @@ def pytest_namespace():
     return {
         'fixture': fixture,
         'yield_fixture': yield_fixture,
-        'raises' : raises,
+        'raises': raises,
+        'approx': approx,
         'collect': {
         'Module': Module, 'Class': Class, 'Instance': Instance,
         'Function': Function, 'Generator': Generator,
@@ -1336,6 +1337,105 @@ class RaisesContext(object):
         self.excinfo.__init__(tp)
         return issubclass(self.excinfo.type, self.expected_exception)
 
+# builtin pytest.approx helper
+
+class approx:
+    """ assert that two numbers (or two sets of numbers) are equal to each
+    other within some margin.
+
+    Due to the intricacies of floating-point arithmetic, numbers that we would
+    intuitively expect to be the same are not always so::
+
+        >>> 0.1 + 0.2 == 0.3
+        False
+
+    This problem is commonly encountered when writing tests, e.g. to make sure
+    that a floating-point function returns the expected values.  The best way
+    to deal with this problem is to assert that two floating point numbers are
+    equal to within some appropriate margin::
+   
+        >>> abs((0.1 + 0.2) - 0.3) < 1e-6
+        True
+       
+    However, comparisons like this are tedious to write and difficult to
+    understand.  Furthermore, absolute comparisons like the one above are
+    usually discouraged in favor of relative comparisons, which can't even be
+    easily written on one line.  The ``approx`` class provides a way to make
+    floating point comparisons that solves both these problems::
+
+        >>> from pytest import approx
+        >>> 0.1 + 0.2 == approx(0.3)
+        True
+
+    ``approx`` also makes is easy to compare ordered sets of numbers, which
+    would otherwise be very tedious::
+
+        >>> (0.1 + 0.2, 0.2 + 0.4) == approx((0.3, 0.6))
+        True
+
+    By default, ``approx`` considers two numbers to be equal if the relative
+    error between them is less than one part in a million (e.g. 1e-6).
+    Relative error is defined as ``abs(x - a) / x`` where ``x`` is the value
+    you're expecting and ``a`` is the value you're comparing to.  This
+    definition breaks down when the numbers being compared get very close to
+    zero, so ``approx`` will also consider two numbers to be equal if the
+    absolute difference between them is less than 1e-100.
+
+    Both the relative and absolute error thresholds can be changed by passing
+    arguments to the ``approx`` constructor::
+
+        >>> 1.0001 == approx(1)
+        False
+        >>> 1.0001 == approx(1, rel=1e-3)
+        True
+        >>> 1.0001 == approx(1, abs=1e-3)
+        True
+
+    Note that if you specify ``abs`` but not ``rel``, the comparison will not
+    consider the relative error between the two values at all.  In other words,
+    two number that are within the default relative error threshold of 1e-6
+    will still be considered unequal if they exceed the specified absolute
+    error threshold::
+
+        >>> 0.1 + 0.2 == approx(0.3, abs=1e-100)
+        False
+    """
+
+    def __init__(self, expected, rel=None, abs=None):
+        self.expected = expected
+        self.max_relative_error = rel
+        self.max_absolute_error = abs
+
+    def __repr__(self):
+        from collections import Iterable
+        plus_minus = lambda x: '{}\u00B1{}'.format(x, self._margin(x))
+
+        if isinstance(self.expected, Iterable):
+            return str([plus_minus(x) for x in self.expected])
+        else:
+            plus_minus(self.expected)
+
+    def __eq__(self, actual):
+        from collections import Iterable
+        expected = self.expected
+        almost_eq = lambda a, x: abs(x - a) < self._margin(x)
+
+        if isinstance(actual, Iterable) and isinstance(expected, Iterable):
+            return all(almost_eq(a, x) for a, x in zip(actual, expected))
+        else:
+            return almost_eq(actual, expected)
+
+    def _margin(self, x):
+        margin = self.max_absolute_error or 1e-100
+
+        if self.max_relative_error is None:
+            if self.max_absolute_error is not None:
+                return margin
+
+        return max(margin, x * (self.max_relative_error or 1e-6))
+
+
+
 #
 #  the basic pytest Function item
 #
diff --git a/testing/python/approx.py b/testing/python/approx.py
new file mode 100644
index 000000000..76064114d
--- /dev/null
+++ b/testing/python/approx.py
@@ -0,0 +1,27 @@
+import pytest
+import doctest
+
+class MyDocTestRunner(doctest.DocTestRunner):
+
+    def __init__(self):
+        doctest.DocTestRunner.__init__(self)
+
+    def report_failure(self, out, test, example, got):
+        raise AssertionError("'{}' evaluates to '{}', not '{}'".format(
+            example.source.strip(), got.strip(), example.want.strip()))
+
+
+class TestApprox:
+
+    def test_approx(self):
+        parser = doctest.DocTestParser()
+        test = parser.get_doctest(
+                pytest.approx.__doc__,
+                {'approx': pytest.approx},
+                pytest.approx.__name__,
+                None, None,
+        )
+        runner = MyDocTestRunner()
+        runner.run(test)
+
+