diff --git a/tools/train.py b/tools/train.py
index aa98bba305..d4cff2de23 100644
--- a/tools/train.py
+++ b/tools/train.py
@@ -88,6 +88,13 @@ def make_parser():
                 Implemented loggers include `tensorboard`, `mlflow` and `wandb`.",
         default="tensorboard"
     )
+    parser.add_argument(
+        "--early-stopping",
+        dest="early_stopping",
+        default=False,
+        action="store_true",
+        help="Use early stopping to prevent overfitting.",
+    )
     parser.add_argument(
         "opts",
         help="Modify config options using the command-line",
@@ -115,6 +122,13 @@ def main(exp: Exp, args):
     cudnn.benchmark = True
 
     trainer = exp.get_trainer(args)
+
+    # configure early stopping parameters
+    if args.early_stopping:
+        # requires 1% relative improvement over 10 epochs to reset patience
+        # available modes: "max", "min", "percentage"
+        trainer.early_stopper = exp.get_early_stopping(patience=10, min_delta=0.01, mode="percentage")
+
     trainer.train()
 
 
diff --git a/yolox/core/__init__.py b/yolox/core/__init__.py
index c2379c704e..46a5ba7061 100644
--- a/yolox/core/__init__.py
+++ b/yolox/core/__init__.py
@@ -4,3 +4,4 @@
 
 from .launch import launch
 from .trainer import Trainer
+from .trainer import EarlyStopping
diff --git a/yolox/core/trainer.py b/yolox/core/trainer.py
index 8f8016e578..2a78fd8db2 100644
--- a/yolox/core/trainer.py
+++ b/yolox/core/trainer.py
@@ -33,6 +33,42 @@
     synchronize
 )
 
+class EarlyStopping:
+    def __init__(self, patience: int, min_delta: float, mode="max"):
+        self.patience = patience
+        self.min_delta = min_delta
+        self.mode = mode # "max", "min", "percentage"
+        self.best = None
+        self.counter = 0
+
+    def step(self, value):
+        # Initialize best value on first call
+        if self.best is None:
+            self.best = value
+            return False
+
+        # Compute improvement depending on mode
+        if self.mode == "max":
+            improvement = value - self.best
+        elif self.mode == "min":
+            improvement = self.best - value
+        elif self.mode == "percentage":
+            if self.best == 0:
+                improvement = 0  # avoid division by zero
+            else:
+                improvement = (value - self.best) / abs(self.best)
+        else:
+            raise ValueError(f"Unknown mode: {self.mode}, supported modes are 'max', 'min', 'percentage'.")
+
+        # Check if improvement is sufficient
+        if improvement > self.min_delta:
+            self.best = value
+            self.counter = 0
+        else:
+            self.counter += 1
+
+        return self.counter >= self.patience
+
 
 class Trainer:
     def __init__(self, exp: Exp, args):
@@ -40,6 +76,7 @@ def __init__(self, exp: Exp, args):
         # before_train methods.
         self.exp = exp
         self.args = args
+        self.early_stopper = None
 
         # training related attr
         self.max_epoch = exp.max_epoch
@@ -234,7 +271,15 @@ def after_epoch(self):
 
         if (self.epoch + 1) % self.exp.eval_interval == 0:
             all_reduce_norm(self.model)
-            self.evaluate_and_save_model()
+            ap50_95 = self.evaluate_and_save_model()
+
+        # Early stopping
+        if self.early_stopper is not None:
+            if self.early_stopper.step(ap50_95):
+                logger.info(f"Early stopping triggered at epoch {self.epoch}. " f"Best AP: {self.early_stopper.best}")
+                # save best checkpoint before exiting
+                self.save_ckpt("best_ckpt")
+                raise SystemExit
 
     def before_iter(self):
         pass
@@ -395,6 +440,7 @@ def evaluate_and_save_model(self):
                 }
             self.mlflow_logger.save_checkpoints(self.args, self.exp, self.file_name, self.epoch,
                                                 metadata, update_best_ckpt)
+        return ap50_95
 
     def save_ckpt(self, ckpt_name, update_best_ckpt=False, ap=None):
         if self.rank == 0:
diff --git a/yolox/exp/yolox_base.py b/yolox/exp/yolox_base.py
index 82e93c21bd..6815c6977c 100644
--- a/yolox/exp/yolox_base.py
+++ b/yolox/exp/yolox_base.py
@@ -349,6 +349,11 @@ def get_trainer(self, args):
         # NOTE: trainer shouldn't be an attribute of exp object
         return trainer
 
+    def get_early_stopping(self, patience, min_delta, mode):
+        from yolox.core import EarlyStopping
+
+        return EarlyStopping(patience=patience, min_delta=min_delta, mode=mode)
+
     def eval(self, model, evaluator, is_distributed, half=False, return_outputs=False):
         return evaluator.evaluate(model, is_distributed, half, return_outputs=return_outputs)