diff --git a/arch/Kconfig b/arch/Kconfig
index ba4e966484ab..ddd4641446bd 100644
--- a/arch/Kconfig
+++ b/arch/Kconfig
@@ -143,6 +143,22 @@ config UPROBES
 	    managed by the kernel and kept transparent to the probed
 	    application. )
 
+config HAVE_64BIT_ALIGNED_ACCESS
+	def_bool 64BIT && !HAVE_EFFICIENT_UNALIGNED_ACCESS
+	help
+	  Some architectures require 64 bit accesses to be 64 bit
+	  aligned, which also requires structs containing 64 bit values
+	  to be 64 bit aligned too. This includes some 32 bit
+	  architectures which can do 64 bit accesses, as well as 64 bit
+	  architectures without unaligned access.
+
+	  This symbol should be selected by an architecture if 64 bit
+	  accesses are required to be 64 bit aligned in this way even
+	  though it is not a 64 bit architecture.
+
+	  See Documentation/unaligned-memory-access.txt for more
+	  information on the topic of unaligned memory accesses.
+
 config HAVE_EFFICIENT_UNALIGNED_ACCESS
 	bool
 	help
diff --git a/kernel/trace/ring_buffer.c b/kernel/trace/ring_buffer.c
index a6268e09160a..ddeb865706ba 100644
--- a/kernel/trace/ring_buffer.c
+++ b/kernel/trace/ring_buffer.c
@@ -129,7 +129,16 @@ int ring_buffer_print_entry_header(struct trace_seq *s)
 #define RB_ALIGNMENT		4U
 #define RB_MAX_SMALL_DATA	(RB_ALIGNMENT * RINGBUF_TYPE_DATA_TYPE_LEN_MAX)
 #define RB_EVNT_MIN_SIZE	8U	/* two 32bit words */
-#define RB_ALIGN_DATA		__aligned(RB_ALIGNMENT)
+
+#ifndef CONFIG_HAVE_64BIT_ALIGNED_ACCESS
+# define RB_FORCE_8BYTE_ALIGNMENT	0
+# define RB_ARCH_ALIGNMENT		RB_ALIGNMENT
+#else
+# define RB_FORCE_8BYTE_ALIGNMENT	1
+# define RB_ARCH_ALIGNMENT		8U
+#endif
+
+#define RB_ALIGN_DATA		__aligned(RB_ARCH_ALIGNMENT)
 
 /* define RINGBUF_TYPE_DATA for 'case RINGBUF_TYPE_DATA:' */
 #define RINGBUF_TYPE_DATA 0 ... RINGBUF_TYPE_DATA_TYPE_LEN_MAX
@@ -2719,7 +2728,7 @@ rb_update_event(struct ring_buffer_per_cpu *cpu_buffer,
 
 	event->time_delta = delta;
 	length -= RB_EVNT_HDR_SIZE;
-	if (length > RB_MAX_SMALL_DATA) {
+	if (length > RB_MAX_SMALL_DATA || RB_FORCE_8BYTE_ALIGNMENT) {
 		event->type_len = 0;
 		event->array[0] = length;
 	} else
@@ -2734,11 +2743,11 @@ static unsigned rb_calculate_event_length(unsigned length)
 	if (!length)
 		length++;
 
-	if (length > RB_MAX_SMALL_DATA)
+	if (length > RB_MAX_SMALL_DATA || RB_FORCE_8BYTE_ALIGNMENT)
 		length += sizeof(event.array[0]);
 
 	length += RB_EVNT_HDR_SIZE;
-	length = ALIGN(length, RB_ALIGNMENT);
+	length = ALIGN(length, RB_ARCH_ALIGNMENT);
 
 	/*
 	 * In case the time delta is larger than the 27 bits for it