diff --git a/app/helpers/gitlab_markdown_helper.rb b/app/helpers/gitlab_markdown_helper.rb
index b7fec9fc1d9..924e6cb1979 100644
--- a/app/helpers/gitlab_markdown_helper.rb
+++ b/app/helpers/gitlab_markdown_helper.rb
@@ -38,6 +38,11 @@ module GitlabMarkdownHelper
       end
     end
 
+    # Add any custom CSS classes to the GFM-generated reference links
+    if html_options[:class]
+      fragment.css('a.gfm').add_class(html_options[:class])
+    end
+
     fragment.to_html.html_safe
   end
 
diff --git a/spec/helpers/gitlab_markdown_helper_spec.rb b/spec/helpers/gitlab_markdown_helper_spec.rb
index d1ca2337a9b..0f9c587432d 100644
--- a/spec/helpers/gitlab_markdown_helper_spec.rb
+++ b/spec/helpers/gitlab_markdown_helper_spec.rb
@@ -79,6 +79,16 @@ describe GitlabMarkdownHelper do
       expect(doc.css('a')[4].text).to eq ' for real'
     end
 
+    it 'should forward HTML options' do
+      actual = link_to_gfm("Fixed in #{commit.id}", commit_path, class: 'foo')
+      doc = Nokogiri::HTML.parse(actual)
+
+      expect(doc.css('a')).to satisfy do |v|
+        # 'foo' gets added to all links
+        v.all? { |a| a.attr('class').match(/foo$/) }
+      end
+    end
+
     it "escapes HTML passed in as the body" do
       actual = "This is a <h1>test</h1> - see #{issues[0].to_reference}"
       expect(link_to_gfm(actual, commit_path)).