diff --git a/Doc/library/functions.rst b/Doc/library/functions.rst
index 3789e202cee..0232e1bddc7 100644
--- a/Doc/library/functions.rst
+++ b/Doc/library/functions.rst
@@ -425,6 +425,26 @@ available.  They are listed here in alphabetical order.
 
    The float type is described in :ref:`typesnumeric`.
 
+
+.. function:: format(value[, format_spec])
+
+   .. index::
+      pair: str; format
+      single: __format__
+
+   Convert a *value* to a "formatted" representation, as controlled by
+   *format_spec*.  The interpretation of *format_spec* will depend on the type
+   of the *value* argument, however there is a standard formatting syntax that
+   is used by most built-in types: :ref:`formatspec`.
+
+   .. note::
+
+      ``format(value, format_spec)`` merely calls
+      ``value.__format__(format_spec)``.
+
+   .. versionadded:: 2.6
+
+
 .. function:: frozenset([iterable])
    :noindex: