diff --git a/CHANGELOG b/CHANGELOG
index 57768d6b3eb7dbbe5d8ff9759154a1ff1cb3b9fe..0f9711adae46c58469fa062df45f25b9c295a412 100644
--- a/CHANGELOG
+++ b/CHANGELOG
@@ -67,6 +67,7 @@ v 8.1.0 (unreleased)
   - Only render 404 page from /public
   - Hide passwords from services API (Alex Lossent)
   - Fix: Images cannot show when projects' path was changed
+  - Let gitlab-git-http-server generate and serve 'git archive' downloads
 
 v 8.0.4
   - Fix Message-ID header to be RFC 2111-compliant to prevent e-mails being dropped (Stan Hu)
diff --git a/app/models/repository.rb b/app/models/repository.rb
index 921e1a9e426fc8369cee798aeff3e493d0f1292b..d55d695b42c14164aeb34a869348213a79d65195 100644
--- a/app/models/repository.rb
+++ b/app/models/repository.rb
@@ -8,6 +8,14 @@ class Repository
 
   attr_accessor :raw_repository, :path_with_namespace, :project
 
+  def self.clean_old_archives
+    repository_downloads_path = Gitlab.config.gitlab.repository_downloads_path
+
+    return unless File.directory?(repository_downloads_path)
+
+    Gitlab::Popen.popen(%W(find #{repository_downloads_path} -not -path #{repository_downloads_path} -mmin +120 -delete))
+  end
+
   def initialize(path_with_namespace, default_branch = nil, project = nil)
     @path_with_namespace = path_with_namespace
     @project = project
@@ -269,14 +277,6 @@ class Repository
   end
 
   # Remove archives older than 2 hours
-  def clean_old_archives
-    repository_downloads_path = Gitlab.config.gitlab.repository_downloads_path
-
-    return unless File.directory?(repository_downloads_path)
-
-    Gitlab::Popen.popen(%W(find #{repository_downloads_path} -not -path #{repository_downloads_path} -mmin +120 -delete))
-  end
-
   def branches_sorted_by(value)
     case value
     when 'recently_updated'
diff --git a/app/services/archive_repository_service.rb b/app/services/archive_repository_service.rb
index 6414b5a0184a987831c24cd1714811ae6cfc6c49..2160bf13e6d281cbc073e3e827d4bdee8d7558f3 100644
--- a/app/services/archive_repository_service.rb
+++ b/app/services/archive_repository_service.rb
@@ -7,7 +7,7 @@ class ArchiveRepositoryService
   end
 
   def execute(options = {})
-    project.repository.clean_old_archives
+    RepositoryArchiveCacheWorker.perform_async
 
     metadata = project.repository.archive_metadata(ref, storage_path, format)
     raise "Repository or ref not found" if metadata.empty?
diff --git a/app/workers/repository_archive_cache_worker.rb b/app/workers/repository_archive_cache_worker.rb
new file mode 100644
index 0000000000000000000000000000000000000000..47c5a670ed4d17eb00a71ef7c4ccd542577c859e
--- /dev/null
+++ b/app/workers/repository_archive_cache_worker.rb
@@ -0,0 +1,9 @@
+class RepositoryArchiveCacheWorker
+  include Sidekiq::Worker
+
+  sidekiq_options queue: :default
+
+  def perform
+    Repository.clean_old_archives
+  end
+end
diff --git a/spec/services/archive_repository_service_spec.rb b/spec/services/archive_repository_service_spec.rb
index 1cc7b2402168112d5c9079dc92fcc164ecc7abe9..f7a36cd96705025a15ba2ce40b15a19f37cdc3fb 100644
--- a/spec/services/archive_repository_service_spec.rb
+++ b/spec/services/archive_repository_service_spec.rb
@@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ describe ArchiveRepositoryService do
 
   describe "#execute" do
     it "cleans old archives" do
-      expect(project.repository).to receive(:clean_old_archives)
+      expect(RepositoryArchiveCacheWorker).to receive(:perform_async)
 
       subject.execute(timeout: 0.0)
     end