diff --git a/railties/lib/rails/generators/app_base.rb b/railties/lib/rails/generators/app_base.rb
index 119a7cb829..061fafb156 100644
--- a/railties/lib/rails/generators/app_base.rb
+++ b/railties/lib/rails/generators/app_base.rb
@@ -174,6 +174,10 @@ module Rails
         options[value] ? '# ' : ''
       end
 
+      def keeps?
+        !options[:skip_keeps]
+      end
+
       def sqlite3?
         !options[:skip_active_record] && options[:database] == 'sqlite3'
       end
@@ -355,7 +359,7 @@ module Rails
       end
 
       def keep_file(destination)
-        create_file("#{destination}/.keep") unless options[:skip_keeps]
+        create_file("#{destination}/.keep") if keeps?
       end
     end
   end
diff --git a/railties/lib/rails/generators/rails/app/templates/gitignore b/railties/lib/rails/generators/rails/app/templates/gitignore
index 7c6f2098b8..e4a00ad181 100644
--- a/railties/lib/rails/generators/rails/app/templates/gitignore
+++ b/railties/lib/rails/generators/rails/app/templates/gitignore
@@ -15,5 +15,7 @@
 <% end -%>
 # Ignore all logfiles and tempfiles.
 /log/*
+<% if keeps? -%>
 !/log/.keep
+<% end -%>
 /tmp
diff --git a/railties/test/generators/shared_generator_tests.rb b/railties/test/generators/shared_generator_tests.rb
index 3bcf3894ce..3a2195035f 100644
--- a/railties/test/generators/shared_generator_tests.rb
+++ b/railties/test/generators/shared_generator_tests.rb
@@ -138,7 +138,11 @@ module SharedGeneratorTests
 
   def test_skip_keeps
     run_generator [destination_root, '--skip-keeps', '--full']
-    assert_file('.gitignore')
+
+    assert_file '.gitignore' do |content|
+      assert_no_match(/\.keep/, content)
+    end
+
     assert_no_file('app/mailers/.keep')
   end
 end