diff --git a/Test/Flurl.Test/Http/RealHttpTests.cs b/Test/Flurl.Test/Http/RealHttpTests.cs
index 2c26539..181fa78 100644
--- a/Test/Flurl.Test/Http/RealHttpTests.cs
+++ b/Test/Flurl.Test/Http/RealHttpTests.cs
@@ -17,6 +17,19 @@ namespace Flurl.Test.Http
 	[TestFixture, Parallelizable]
 	public class RealHttpTests
 	{
+		[TestCase("gzip")]
+		[TestCase("deflate")]
+		public async Task decompresses_automatically(string encoding) {
+			var page = DateTime.Now.Ticks % 10 + 1; // vary it a bit to avoid possible rate limit errors
+			Console.WriteLine(page);
+			dynamic d2 = await $"https://api.stackexchange.com/2.2/answers?site=stackoverflow&pagesize=10&page={page}"
+				.WithHeader("Accept-Encoding", encoding)
+				.GetJsonAsync();
+
+			Assert.AreEqual(10, d2.items.Count);
+			Assert.IsTrue(d2.has_more);
+		}
+
 		[Test]
 		public async Task can_download_file() {
 			var folder = "c:\\flurl-test-" + Guid.NewGuid(); // random so parallel tests don't trip over each other
diff --git a/src/Flurl.Http/Configuration/DefaultHttpClientFactory.cs b/src/Flurl.Http/Configuration/DefaultHttpClientFactory.cs
index 4439676..0e5fc95 100644
--- a/src/Flurl.Http/Configuration/DefaultHttpClientFactory.cs
+++ b/src/Flurl.Http/Configuration/DefaultHttpClientFactory.cs
@@ -1,4 +1,5 @@
 using System;
+using System.Net;
 using System.Net.Http;
 
 namespace Flurl.Http.Configuration
@@ -28,7 +29,10 @@ namespace Flurl.Http.Configuration
 		/// customize the result.
 		/// </summary>
 		public virtual HttpMessageHandler CreateMessageHandler() {
-			return new HttpClientHandler();
+			return new HttpClientHandler {
+				// #266
+				AutomaticDecompression = DecompressionMethods.GZip | DecompressionMethods.Deflate
+			};
 		}
 	}
 }
\ No newline at end of file