diff --git a/zsh/zshrc b/zsh/zshrc
index 8f292118c..b1fc9683a 100644
--- a/zsh/zshrc
+++ b/zsh/zshrc
@@ -21,6 +21,12 @@
   return 1
 }
 
+# source nix initialization script if `nix-env` is not active in the environment
+# TODO: figure out cleaner solution to avoid issues when `/etc/zshrc` is moved
+command -v nix-env > /dev/null || {
+  . '/nix/var/nix/profiles/default/etc/profile.d/nix-daemon.sh'
+}
+
 "$DOTFILES/infra/scripts/component_enabled.sh" 'zsh' || return 0
 
 source "$DOTFILES/zsh/path.zsh"