diff --git a/lib/ES/BaseRepo.pm b/lib/ES/BaseRepo.pm
index 63e6a9fb0a5c..7d261b900811 100644
--- a/lib/ES/BaseRepo.pm
+++ b/lib/ES/BaseRepo.pm
@@ -46,7 +46,7 @@ sub update_from_remote {
         unless ( $self->_try_to_fetch ) {
             my $url = $self->url;
             printf(" - %20s: Cloning from <%s>\n", $name, $url);
-            run 'git', 'clone', '--bare', $self->_reference_args, $url, $git_dir;
+            run 'git', 'clone', '--bare', '--no-tags', '--depth=1', $self->_reference_args, $url, $git_dir;
         }
         1;
     }
diff --git a/lib/ES/Repo.pm b/lib/ES/Repo.pm
index 7d81531dac81..6a7ac979c4f7 100644
--- a/lib/ES/Repo.pm
+++ b/lib/ES/Repo.pm
@@ -277,6 +277,7 @@ sub _extract_from_ref {
     $dest->mkpath;
     my $tar = $dest->file( '.temp_git_archive.tar' );
     die "File <$tar> already exists" if -e $tar;
+    run qw(git fetch --no-tags --depth=1 origin), $ref . ':' . $ref;
     run qw(git archive --format=tar -o), $tar, $ref, $path;
 
     run qw(tar -x -C), $dest, '-f', $tar;
diff --git a/lib/ES/TargetRepo.pm b/lib/ES/TargetRepo.pm
index c1514ab00967..5feb4459440d 100644
--- a/lib/ES/TargetRepo.pm
+++ b/lib/ES/TargetRepo.pm
@@ -48,7 +48,7 @@ sub checkout_minimal {
 
     my $original_pwd = Cwd::cwd();
     eval {
-        my $out = run qw(git clone --no-checkout),
+        my $out = run qw(git clone --no-checkout --no-tags --depth=1),
             $self->git_dir, $self->{destination};
 
         # This if statement handles empty repositories in a way that works with