diff --git a/scripts/helper/.gitignore b/scripts/helper/.gitignore
index 3f09a209..6be9783e 100644
--- a/scripts/helper/.gitignore
+++ b/scripts/helper/.gitignore
@@ -1,2 +1,3 @@
 find-idents
+format-xml
 *.o
diff --git a/scripts/helper/Makefile b/scripts/helper/Makefile
index e04f063f..994279b5 100644
--- a/scripts/helper/Makefile
+++ b/scripts/helper/Makefile
@@ -1,12 +1,17 @@
 CFLAGS += -g -Wall -O0 -std=c11
 LDFLAGS += -fsanitize=address
 
-PROGS = find-idents
+PROGS = find-idents format-xml
 
 all: $(PROGS)
 
 find-idents: find-idents.o
 	$(CC) -o $@ $^
 
+format-xml: CFLAGS += `pkg-config --cflags libxml-2.0`
+format-xml: CFLAGS += `pkg-config --libs libxml-2.0`
+format-xml: format-xml.o
+	$(CC) $(CFLAGS) -o $@ $^ $(LDFLAGS)
+
 clean :
 	$(RM) $(PROGS) *.o
diff --git a/scripts/helper/format-xml.c b/scripts/helper/format-xml.c
new file mode 100644
index 00000000..fc6f467f
--- /dev/null
+++ b/scripts/helper/format-xml.c
@@ -0,0 +1,31 @@
+// SPDX-License-Identifier: GPL-2.0-only
+/*
+ * Helper to format XML the way libxml2 does it - because it helps stot
+ * differences when working labwc-tweaks.
+ *
+ * Copyright (C) Johan Malm 2023
+ */
+#define _POSIX_C_SOURCE 200809L
+#include <libxml/parser.h>
+#include <libxml/tree.h>
+#include <stdio.h>
+#include <stdlib.h>
+
+int main(int argc, char **argv)
+{
+	if (argc != 2) {
+		fprintf(stderr, "usage: %s <filename>\n", argv[0]);
+		return EXIT_FAILURE;
+	}
+	const char *filename = argv[1];
+
+	/* Use XML_PARSE_NOBLANKS for xmlSaveFormatFile() to indent nicely */
+	xmlDoc *doc = xmlReadFile(filename, NULL, XML_PARSE_NOBLANKS);
+	if (!doc) {
+		fprintf(stderr, "bad file '%s'\n", filename);
+		return EXIT_FAILURE;
+	}
+	xmlSaveFormatFile(filename, doc, 1);
+	xmlFreeDoc(doc);
+	return EXIT_SUCCESS;
+}