diff --git a/Lib/subprocess.py b/Lib/subprocess.py
index c40f0179eef..809e59f5eb7 100644
--- a/Lib/subprocess.py
+++ b/Lib/subprocess.py
@@ -1204,7 +1204,10 @@ class Popen(object):
                 args = list(args)
 
             if shell:
-                args = ["/bin/sh", "-c"] + args
+                # On Android the default shell is at '/system/bin/sh'.
+                unix_shell = ('/system/bin/sh' if
+                          hasattr(sys, 'getandroidapilevel') else '/bin/sh')
+                args = [unix_shell, "-c"] + args
                 if executable:
                     args[0] = executable
 
diff --git a/Misc/NEWS b/Misc/NEWS
index fe9dc958908..a06e3cb788e 100644
--- a/Misc/NEWS
+++ b/Misc/NEWS
@@ -177,6 +177,9 @@ Core and Builtins
 Library
 -------
 
+- Issue #16255: subrocess.Popen uses /system/bin/sh on Android as the shell,
+  instead of /bin/sh.
+
 - Issue #28779: multiprocessing.set_forkserver_preload() would crash the
   forkserver process if a preloaded module instantiated some
   multiprocessing objects such as locks.