diff --git a/.coveragerc b/.coveragerc
new file mode 100644
index 0000000000000000000000000000000000000000..12ea1b0d24021ef4bd0a30ad1d3b14d929b6821a
--- /dev/null
+++ b/.coveragerc
@@ -0,0 +1,4 @@
+[run]
+omit =
+    # exclude tests files from coverage calculation
+    pymc3/tests/test_*.py