diff --git a/CHANGELOG.md b/CHANGELOG.md
index 8ca60ba1..1e1869e1 100644
--- a/CHANGELOG.md
+++ b/CHANGELOG.md
@@ -26,12 +26,14 @@ and this project adheres to [Semantic Versioning](https://semver.org/spec/v2.0.0
 - Applying filters for `merlin detailed-status` will now log debug statements instead of warnings
 - Modified the unit tests for the `merlin status` command to use pytest rather than unittest
 - Added fixtures for `merlin status` tests that copy the workspace to a temporary directory so you can see exactly what's run in a test
+- Batch block and workers now allow for variables to be used in node settings
 
 ### Fixed
 - Bugfix for output of `merlin example openfoam_wf_singularity`
 - A bug with the CHANGELOG detection test when the target branch isn't in the ci runner history
 - Link to Merlin banner in readme
 - Issue with escape sequences in ascii art (caught by python 3.12)
+- Bug where Flux wasn't identifying total number of nodes on an allocation
 
 
 ## [1.12.1]
diff --git a/merlin/spec/merlinspec.json b/merlin/spec/merlinspec.json
index 4b8ca363..7e9c912e 100644
--- a/merlin/spec/merlinspec.json
+++ b/merlin/spec/merlinspec.json
@@ -221,7 +221,8 @@
                   "nodes": {
                     "anyOf": [
                       {"type": "null"},
-                      {"type": "integer", "minimum": 1}
+                      {"type": "integer", "minimum": 1},
+                      {"type": "string", "pattern": "^\\$\\(\\w+\\)$"}
                     ]
                   },
                   "batch": {
@@ -279,7 +280,12 @@
       "launch_pre": {"type": "string", "minLength": 1},
       "launch_args": {"type": "string", "minLength": 1},
       "worker_launch": {"type": "string", "minLength": 1},
-      "nodes": {"type": "integer", "minimum": 1},
+      "nodes": {
+        "anyOf": [
+          {"type": "integer", "minimum": 1},
+          {"type": "string","pattern": "^\\$\\(\\w+\\)$"}
+        ]
+      },
       "walltime": {
         "anyOf": [
           {"type": "string", "minLength": 1},
diff --git a/merlin/study/batch.py b/merlin/study/batch.py
index 4c8f3e49..b8c7cc95 100644
--- a/merlin/study/batch.py
+++ b/merlin/study/batch.py
@@ -134,6 +134,14 @@ def get_node_count(default=1):
         the environment cannot be determined.
     :param returns: (int) The number of nodes to use.
     """
+
+    # If flux is the scheduler, we can get the size of the allocation with this
+    try:
+        get_size_proc = subprocess.run("flux getattr size", shell=True, capture_output=True, text=True)
+        return int(get_size_proc.stdout)
+    except Exception:
+        pass
+
     if "SLURM_JOB_NUM_NODES" in os.environ:
         return int(os.environ["SLURM_JOB_NUM_NODES"])
 
diff --git a/tests/integration/definitions.py b/tests/integration/definitions.py
index 51c7fe6b..59c1fa25 100644
--- a/tests/integration/definitions.py
+++ b/tests/integration/definitions.py
@@ -295,6 +295,11 @@ def define_tests():  # pylint: disable=R0914,R0915
             "conditions": [HasReturnCode(), HasRegex(r"default_worker", negate=True)],
             "run type": "local",
         },
+        "run-workers echo variable for worker nodes": {
+            "cmds": f"{workers_flux} {flux_native} --echo",
+            "conditions": [HasReturnCode(), HasRegex(r"-N 4")],
+            "run type": "local",
+        },
     }
     wf_format_tests = {
         "local minimum_format": {
diff --git a/tests/integration/test_specs/flux_par_native_test.yaml b/tests/integration/test_specs/flux_par_native_test.yaml
index 8eaf4b02..6fd9021a 100644
--- a/tests/integration/test_specs/flux_par_native_test.yaml
+++ b/tests/integration/test_specs/flux_par_native_test.yaml
@@ -14,6 +14,7 @@ env:
     OUTPUT_PATH: ./studies
     N_SAMPLES: 10
     SCRIPTS: $(SPECROOT)/../../../merlin/examples/workflows/flux/scripts
+    WORKER_NODES: 4
 
 study:
 - description: Build the code
@@ -71,6 +72,7 @@ merlin:
       simworkers:
         args: -l INFO --concurrency 1 --prefetch-multiplier 1 -Ofair
         steps: [runs, data]
+        nodes: $(WORKER_NODES)
   samples:
     column_labels: [V1, V2]
     file: $(MERLIN_INFO)/samples.npy