diff --git a/man/machinectl.xml b/man/machinectl.xml
index 4b7f9a0391..d3891332e4 100644
--- a/man/machinectl.xml
+++ b/man/machinectl.xml
@@ -373,8 +373,7 @@
         <para>To interactively start a container on the command line
         with full access to the container's console, please invoke
         <command>systemd-nspawn</command> directly. To stop a running
-        container use <command>machinectl poweroff</command>, see
-        below.</para></listitem>
+        container use <command>machinectl poweroff</command>.</para></listitem>
       </varlistentry>
 
       <varlistentry>
@@ -461,8 +460,8 @@
         <listitem><para>Power off one or more containers. This will
         trigger a reboot by sending SIGRTMIN+4 to the container's init
         process, which causes systemd-compatible init systems to shut
-        down cleanly. This operation does not work on containers that
-        do not run a
+        down cleanly. Use <command>stop</command> as alias for <command>poweroff</command>.
+        This operation does not work on containers that do not run a
         <citerefentry><refentrytitle>systemd</refentrytitle><manvolnum>1</manvolnum></citerefentry>-compatible
         init system, such as sysvinit. Use
         <command>terminate</command> (see below) to immediately
diff --git a/shell-completion/bash/machinectl b/shell-completion/bash/machinectl
index e7829ca968..aebe48304d 100644
--- a/shell-completion/bash/machinectl
+++ b/shell-completion/bash/machinectl
@@ -41,7 +41,7 @@ _machinectl() {
 
         local -A VERBS=(
                [STANDALONE]='list list-images pull-tar pull-raw import-tar import-raw export-tar export-raw list-transfers cancel-transfer'
-                 [MACHINES]='status show start login shell enable disable poweroff reboot terminate kill copy-to copy-from image-status show-image clone rename read-only remove set-limit'
+                 [MACHINES]='status show start stop login shell enable disable poweroff reboot terminate kill copy-to copy-from image-status show-image clone rename read-only remove set-limit'
         )
 
         _init_completion || return
diff --git a/shell-completion/zsh/_machinectl b/shell-completion/zsh/_machinectl
index 198fa28f7b..92d77109a5 100644
--- a/shell-completion/zsh/_machinectl
+++ b/shell-completion/zsh/_machinectl
@@ -23,6 +23,7 @@ _available_machines() {
     "status:Show VM/container status"
     "show:Show properties of one or more VMs/containers"
     "start:Start container as a service"
+    "stop:Stop container (equal to poweroff)"
     "login:Get a login prompt on a VM/container"
     "enable:Enable automatic container start at boot"
     "disable:Disable automatic container start at boot"
diff --git a/src/machine/machinectl.c b/src/machine/machinectl.c
index 8e4ffa9a39..afe5026373 100644
--- a/src/machine/machinectl.c
+++ b/src/machine/machinectl.c
@@ -2720,6 +2720,7 @@ static int machinectl_main(int argc, char *argv[], sd_bus *bus) {
                 { "terminate",       2,        VERB_ANY, 0,            terminate_machine },
                 { "reboot",          2,        VERB_ANY, 0,            reboot_machine    },
                 { "poweroff",        2,        VERB_ANY, 0,            poweroff_machine  },
+                { "stop",            2,        VERB_ANY, 0,            poweroff_machine  }, /* Convenience alias */
                 { "kill",            2,        VERB_ANY, 0,            kill_machine      },
                 { "login",           VERB_ANY, 2,        0,            login_machine     },
                 { "shell",           VERB_ANY, VERB_ANY, 0,            shell_machine     },