diff --git a/lix/legacy/nix-env.cc b/lix/legacy/nix-env.cc
index 6bd21a348..99ad20ba8 100644
--- a/lix/legacy/nix-env.cc
+++ b/lix/legacy/nix-env.cc
@@ -1137,7 +1137,7 @@ static void opQuery(Globals & globals, Strings opFlags, Strings opArgs)
         Table table;
         std::ostringstream xmlStream;
         XMLWriter xml(true, xmlStream);
-        XMLOpenElement xmlRoot(xml, "items");
+        xml.openElement("items");
 
         for (auto & i : elems) {
             try {
@@ -1366,6 +1366,9 @@ static void opQuery(Globals & globals, Strings opFlags, Strings opArgs)
             }
         }
 
+        // </items>
+        xml.closeElement();
+
         if (!xmlOutput) {
             pager << formatTable(table);
         } else {
diff --git a/tests/functional2/commands/test_env_query_xml.py b/tests/functional2/commands/test_env_query_xml.py
new file mode 100644
index 000000000..e47af13c7
--- /dev/null
+++ b/tests/functional2/commands/test_env_query_xml.py
@@ -0,0 +1,22 @@
+from xml.etree import ElementTree
+
+from testlib.fixtures.file_helper import with_files
+from testlib.fixtures.nix import Nix
+from testlib.utils import get_global_asset_pack
+
+
+@with_files(get_global_asset_pack("dependencies"))
+def test_correct_xml(nix: Nix):
+    """Test that nix-env --query --xml produces valid XML."""
+    query_output = (
+        nix.nix_env(
+            ["--query", "--available", "--attr-path", "--xml", "--file", "./dependencies.nix"]
+        )
+        .run()
+        .ok()
+        .stdout_plain
+    )
+
+    # Should parse without raising.
+    parsed = ElementTree.fromstring(query_output)
+    assert parsed.tag == "items"