diff --git a/youtube_dl/YoutubeDL.py b/youtube_dl/YoutubeDL.py
index 4493fd0e1..814d3f721 100755
--- a/youtube_dl/YoutubeDL.py
+++ b/youtube_dl/YoutubeDL.py
@@ -1,3 +1,4 @@
+
 #!/usr/bin/env python
 # coding: utf-8
 
@@ -314,7 +315,8 @@ class YoutubeDL(object):
     The following options are used by the Youtube extractor:
     youtube_include_dash_manifest: If True (default), DASH manifests and related
                         data will be downloaded and processed by extractor.
-                        You can reduce network I/O by disabling it if you don't
+
+                       You can reduce network I/O by disabling it if you don't
                         care about DASH.
     """
 
@@ -1777,6 +1779,8 @@ class YoutubeDL(object):
             annofn = replace_extension(filename, 'annotations.xml', info_dict.get('ext'))
             if self.params.get('nooverwrites', False) and os.path.exists(encodeFilename(annofn)):
                 self.to_screen('[info] Video annotations are already present')
+            elif not '<annotation id=' in info_dict['annotations'] and self.params.get('writefullannotations', False):
+                    self.to_screen('[info] Annotation file is empty. Skipping')
             else:
                 try:
                     self.to_screen('[info] Writing video annotations to: ' + annofn)
diff --git a/youtube_dl/__init__.py b/youtube_dl/__init__.py
index ba435ea42..45e287a57 100644
--- a/youtube_dl/__init__.py
+++ b/youtube_dl/__init__.py
@@ -365,6 +365,7 @@ def _real_main(argv=None):
         'nopart': opts.nopart,
         'updatetime': opts.updatetime,
         'writedescription': opts.writedescription,
+        'writefullannotations': opts.writefullannotations,
         'writeannotations': opts.writeannotations,
         'writeinfojson': opts.writeinfojson,
         'writethumbnail': opts.writethumbnail,
diff --git a/youtube_dl/options.py b/youtube_dl/options.py
index e7d8e8910..d71ffbe8d 100644
--- a/youtube_dl/options.py
+++ b/youtube_dl/options.py
@@ -741,6 +741,10 @@ def parseOpts(overrideArguments=None):
         '--write-info-json',
         action='store_true', dest='writeinfojson', default=False,
         help='Write video metadata to a .info.json file')
+    filesystem.add_option(
+        '--skip-empty-annotations',
+        action='store_true', dest='writefullannotations', default=False,
+        help='Used with --write-annotations. Will not save annotation file if there are no annotations')
     filesystem.add_option(
         '--write-annotations',
         action='store_true', dest='writeannotations', default=False,