diff --git a/python/gui/qgspanelwidget.sip b/python/gui/qgspanelwidget.sip
index 254b77300a5e..ce45698b24fb 100644
--- a/python/gui/qgspanelwidget.sip
+++ b/python/gui/qgspanelwidget.sip
@@ -60,7 +60,7 @@ class QgsPanelWidget : public QWidget
 
     /**
      * The the auto delete property on the widget. True by default.
-     * When auto delete is enabeld when a panel is removed from the stack
+     * When auto delete is enabled when a panel is removed from the stack
      * it will be deleted.
      * @param autoDelete Enable or disable auto delete on the panel.
      */
@@ -68,12 +68,20 @@ class QgsPanelWidget : public QWidget
 
     /**
      * The the auto delete property on the widget. True by default.
-     * When auto delete is enabeld when a panel is removed from the stack
+     * When auto delete is enabled when a panel is removed from the stack
      * it will be deleted.
      * @returns The auto delete value for the widget.
      */
     bool autoDelete();
 
+    /** Traces through the parents of a widget to find if it is contained within a QgsPanelWidget
+     * widget.
+     * @param widget widget which may be contained within a panel widget
+     * @returns parent panel widget if found, otherwise nullptr
+     * @note added in QGIS 3.0
+     */
+    static QgsPanelWidget* findParentPanel( QWidget* widget );
+
   signals:
 
     /**
diff --git a/src/gui/qgspanelwidget.cpp b/src/gui/qgspanelwidget.cpp
index fa009c3311db..c0d56f7061e1 100644
--- a/src/gui/qgspanelwidget.cpp
+++ b/src/gui/qgspanelwidget.cpp
@@ -47,6 +47,19 @@ void QgsPanelWidget::setDockMode( bool dockMode )
   mDockMode = dockMode;
 }
 
+QgsPanelWidget*QgsPanelWidget::findParentPanel( QWidget* widget )
+{
+  QWidget* p = widget;
+  while ( p )
+  {
+    if ( QgsPanelWidget* panel = qobject_cast< QgsPanelWidget* >( p ) )
+      return panel;
+
+    p = p->parentWidget();
+  }
+  return nullptr;
+}
+
 void QgsPanelWidget::openPanel( QgsPanelWidget* panel )
 {
   if ( mDockMode )
diff --git a/src/gui/qgspanelwidget.h b/src/gui/qgspanelwidget.h
index 6bd48c61900f..c45c4e0c658c 100644
--- a/src/gui/qgspanelwidget.h
+++ b/src/gui/qgspanelwidget.h
@@ -79,7 +79,7 @@ class GUI_EXPORT QgsPanelWidget : public QWidget
 
     /**
      * The the auto delete property on the widget. True by default.
-     * When auto delete is enabeld when a panel is removed from the stack
+     * When auto delete is enabled when a panel is removed from the stack
      * it will be deleted.
      * @param autoDelete Enable or disable auto delete on the panel.
      */
@@ -87,12 +87,20 @@ class GUI_EXPORT QgsPanelWidget : public QWidget
 
     /**
      * The the auto delete property on the widget. True by default.
-     * When auto delete is enabeld when a panel is removed from the stack
+     * When auto delete is enabled when a panel is removed from the stack
      * it will be deleted.
      * @returns The auto delete value for the widget.
      */
     bool autoDelete() { return mAutoDelete; }
 
+    /** Traces through the parents of a widget to find if it is contained within a QgsPanelWidget
+     * widget.
+     * @param widget widget which may be contained within a panel widget
+     * @returns parent panel widget if found, otherwise nullptr
+     * @note added in QGIS 3.0
+     */
+    static QgsPanelWidget* findParentPanel( QWidget* widget );
+
   signals:
 
     /**
diff --git a/tests/src/python/CMakeLists.txt b/tests/src/python/CMakeLists.txt
index a8818e7cc7a5..56f002a30b4d 100644
--- a/tests/src/python/CMakeLists.txt
+++ b/tests/src/python/CMakeLists.txt
@@ -64,6 +64,7 @@ ADD_PYTHON_TEST(PyQgsPalLabelingBase test_qgspallabeling_base.py)
 ADD_PYTHON_TEST(PyQgsPalLabelingCanvas test_qgspallabeling_canvas.py)
 ADD_PYTHON_TEST(PyQgsPalLabelingComposer test_qgspallabeling_composer.py)
 ADD_PYTHON_TEST(PyQgsPalLabelingPlacement test_qgspallabeling_placement.py)
+ADD_PYTHON_TEST(PyQgsPanelWidget test_qgspanelwidget.py)
 ADD_PYTHON_TEST(PyQgsPoint test_qgspoint.py)
 ADD_PYTHON_TEST(PyQgsRangeWidgets test_qgsrangewidgets.py)
 ADD_PYTHON_TEST(PyQgsRasterFileWriter test_qgsrasterfilewriter.py)
diff --git a/tests/src/python/test_qgspanelwidget.py b/tests/src/python/test_qgspanelwidget.py
new file mode 100644
index 000000000000..6cf7e94a5c16
--- /dev/null
+++ b/tests/src/python/test_qgspanelwidget.py
@@ -0,0 +1,54 @@
+# -*- coding: utf-8 -*-
+"""QGIS Unit tests for QgsPanelWidget.
+
+.. note:: This program is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify
+it under the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by
+the Free Software Foundation; either version 2 of the License, or
+(at your option) any later version.
+"""
+__author__ = 'Nyall Dawson'
+__date__ = '16/08/2016'
+__copyright__ = 'Copyright 2016, The QGIS Project'
+# This will get replaced with a git SHA1 when you do a git archive
+__revision__ = '$Format:%H$'
+
+import qgis  # NOQA
+
+from qgis.PyQt.QtWidgets import QWidget
+from qgis.gui import QgsPanelWidget
+from qgis.testing import start_app, unittest
+
+start_app()
+
+
+class TestQgsPanelWidget(unittest.TestCase):
+
+    def testFindParentPanel(self):
+        """ test QgsPanelWidget.findParentPanel """
+
+        # no widget
+        self.assertFalse(QgsPanelWidget.findParentPanel(None))
+
+        # widget with no parent
+        w = QWidget()
+        self.assertFalse(QgsPanelWidget.findParentPanel(w))
+
+        # widget with no panel parent
+        w2 = QWidget(w)
+        self.assertFalse(QgsPanelWidget.findParentPanel(w2))
+
+        # panel widget itself
+        w3 = QgsPanelWidget()
+        self.assertEqual(QgsPanelWidget.findParentPanel(w3), w3)
+
+        # widget with direct QgsPanelWidget parent
+        w4 = QWidget(w3)
+        self.assertEqual(QgsPanelWidget.findParentPanel(w4), w3)
+
+        # widget with QgsPanelWidget grandparent
+        w5 = QWidget(w4)
+        self.assertEqual(QgsPanelWidget.findParentPanel(w5), w3)
+
+
+if __name__ == '__main__':
+    unittest.main()