diff --git a/src/net/http/httputil/reverseproxy.go b/src/net/http/httputil/reverseproxy.go
index 5d39955..8b63368 100644
--- a/src/net/http/httputil/reverseproxy.go
+++ b/src/net/http/httputil/reverseproxy.go
@@ -235,6 +235,15 @@
 	if req.ContentLength == 0 {
 		outreq.Body = nil // Issue 16036: nil Body for http.Transport retries
 	}
+	if outreq.Body != nil {
+		// Reading from the request body after returning from a handler is not
+		// allowed, and the RoundTrip goroutine that reads the Body can outlive
+		// this handler. This can lead to a crash if the handler panics (see
+		// Issue 46866). Although calling Close doesn't guarantee there isn't
+		// any Read in flight after the handle returns, in practice it's safe to
+		// read after closing it.
+		defer outreq.Body.Close()
+	}
 	if outreq.Header == nil {
 		outreq.Header = make(http.Header) // Issue 33142: historical behavior was to always allocate
 	}
diff --git a/src/net/http/httputil/reverseproxy_test.go b/src/net/http/httputil/reverseproxy_test.go
index 1898ed8..4b6ad77 100644
--- a/src/net/http/httputil/reverseproxy_test.go
+++ b/src/net/http/httputil/reverseproxy_test.go
@@ -1122,6 +1122,45 @@
 	rproxy.ServeHTTP(httptest.NewRecorder(), req)
 }
 
+// Issue #46866: panic without closing incoming request body causes a panic
+func TestReverseProxy_PanicClosesIncomingBody(t *testing.T) {
+	backend := httptest.NewServer(http.HandlerFunc(func(w http.ResponseWriter, r *http.Request) {
+		out := "this call was relayed by the reverse proxy"
+		// Coerce a wrong content length to induce io.ErrUnexpectedEOF
+		w.Header().Set("Content-Length", fmt.Sprintf("%d", len(out)*2))
+		fmt.Fprintln(w, out)
+	}))
+	defer backend.Close()
+	backendURL, err := url.Parse(backend.URL)
+	if err != nil {
+		t.Fatal(err)
+	}
+	proxyHandler := NewSingleHostReverseProxy(backendURL)
+	proxyHandler.ErrorLog = log.New(io.Discard, "", 0) // quiet for tests
+	frontend := httptest.NewServer(proxyHandler)
+	defer frontend.Close()
+	frontendClient := frontend.Client()
+
+	var wg sync.WaitGroup
+	for i := 0; i < 2; i++ {
+		wg.Add(1)
+		go func() {
+			defer wg.Done()
+			for j := 0; j < 10; j++ {
+				const reqLen = 6 * 1024 * 1024
+				req, _ := http.NewRequest("POST", frontend.URL, &io.LimitedReader{R: neverEnding('x'), N: reqLen})
+				req.ContentLength = reqLen
+				resp, _ := frontendClient.Transport.RoundTrip(req)
+				if resp != nil {
+					io.Copy(io.Discard, resp.Body)
+					resp.Body.Close()
+				}
+			}
+		}()
+	}
+	wg.Wait()
+}
+
 func TestSelectFlushInterval(t *testing.T) {
 	tests := []struct {
 		name string