diff --git a/internal/ingress/controller/controller.go b/internal/ingress/controller/controller.go
index e7b460d6c0..98aa87b37d 100644
--- a/internal/ingress/controller/controller.go
+++ b/internal/ingress/controller/controller.go
@@ -996,11 +996,32 @@ func (n *NGINXController) createServers(data []*ingress.Ingress,
 				Hostname: host,
 				Locations: []*ingress.Location{
 					{
-						Path:         rootLocation,
-						IsDefBackend: true,
-						Backend:      un,
-						Proxy:        ngxProxy,
-						Service:      &apiv1.Service{},
+						Path:                 rootLocation,
+						IsDefBackend:         true,
+						Backend:              un,
+						Service:              &apiv1.Service{},
+						BasicDigestAuth:      anns.BasicDigestAuth,
+						ClientBodyBufferSize: anns.ClientBodyBufferSize,
+						ConfigurationSnippet: anns.ConfigurationSnippet,
+						CorsConfig:           anns.CorsConfig,
+						ExternalAuth:         anns.ExternalAuth,
+						Proxy:                anns.Proxy,
+						RateLimit:            anns.RateLimit,
+						Redirect:             anns.Redirect,
+						Rewrite:              anns.Rewrite,
+						UpstreamVhost:        anns.UpstreamVhost,
+						Whitelist:            anns.Whitelist,
+						Denied:               anns.Denied,
+						XForwardedPrefix:     anns.XForwardedPrefix,
+						UsePortInRedirects:   anns.UsePortInRedirects,
+						Connection:           anns.Connection,
+						Logs:                 anns.Logs,
+						LuaRestyWAF:          anns.LuaRestyWAF,
+						InfluxDB:             anns.InfluxDB,
+						DefaultBackend:       anns.DefaultBackend,
+						BackendProtocol:      anns.BackendProtocol,
+						CustomHTTPErrors:     anns.CustomHTTPErrors,
+						ModSecurity:          anns.ModSecurity,
 					},
 				},
 				SSLPassthrough: anns.SSLPassthrough,
diff --git a/test/e2e/defaultbackend/with_hosts.go b/test/e2e/defaultbackend/with_hosts.go
new file mode 100644
index 0000000000..c9aeee5034
--- /dev/null
+++ b/test/e2e/defaultbackend/with_hosts.go
@@ -0,0 +1,82 @@
+/*
+Copyright 2017 The Kubernetes Authors.
+
+Licensed under the Apache License, Version 2.0 (the "License");
+you may not use this file except in compliance with the License.
+You may obtain a copy of the License at
+
+    http://www.apache.org/licenses/LICENSE-2.0
+
+Unless required by applicable law or agreed to in writing, software
+distributed under the License is distributed on an "AS IS" BASIS,
+WITHOUT WARRANTIES OR CONDITIONS OF ANY KIND, either express or implied.
+See the License for the specific language governing permissions and
+limitations under the License.
+*/
+
+package defaultbackend
+
+import (
+	. "github.com/onsi/ginkgo"
+	. "github.com/onsi/gomega"
+	"github.com/parnurzeal/gorequest"
+	extensions "k8s.io/api/extensions/v1beta1"
+	metav1 "k8s.io/apimachinery/pkg/apis/meta/v1"
+	"k8s.io/apimachinery/pkg/util/intstr"
+	"k8s.io/ingress-nginx/test/e2e/framework"
+	"net/http"
+	"strings"
+)
+
+var _ = framework.IngressNginxDescribe("Default backend with hosts", func() {
+	f := framework.NewDefaultFramework("default-backend-hosts")
+	host := "foo.com"
+
+	BeforeEach(func() {
+		f.NewEchoDeploymentWithReplicas(1)
+	})
+
+	AfterEach(func() {
+	})
+
+	It("should apply the annotation to the default backend", func() {
+		annotations := map[string]string{
+			"nginx.ingress.kubernetes.io/proxy-buffer-size": "8k",
+		}
+
+		ing := &extensions.Ingress{
+			ObjectMeta: metav1.ObjectMeta{
+				Name:        "default-backend-annotations",
+				Namespace:   f.IngressController.Namespace,
+				Annotations: annotations,
+			},
+			Spec: extensions.IngressSpec{
+				Backend: &extensions.IngressBackend{
+					ServiceName: "http-svc",
+					ServicePort: intstr.FromInt(8080),
+				},
+				Rules: []extensions.IngressRule{
+					{
+						Host: host,
+					},
+				},
+			},
+		}
+
+		f.EnsureIngress(ing)
+
+		f.WaitForNginxServer(host,
+			func(server string) bool {
+				return strings.Contains(server, "proxy_buffer_size 8k;")
+			})
+
+		resp, _, errs := gorequest.New().
+			Get(f.IngressController.HTTPURL).
+			Set("Host", "foo.com").
+			End()
+
+		Expect(errs).Should(BeEmpty())
+		Expect(resp.StatusCode).Should(Equal(http.StatusOK))
+	})
+
+})