diff --git a/.travis.yml b/.travis.yml
index 7a6f1077..5aa9400e 100644
--- a/.travis.yml
+++ b/.travis.yml
@@ -5,4 +5,4 @@ cache: apt
 before_script:
   - sudo apt-get -y install build-essential chrpath git-core libssl-dev libfontconfig1-dev
   - chmod +x ./build.sh
-script: ./build.sh --confirm
+script: ./build.sh --confirm --silent
diff --git a/build.sh b/build.sh
index 188f4e75..b01e8d16 100755
--- a/build.sh
+++ b/build.sh
@@ -33,6 +33,8 @@ if [[ "$COMPILE_JOBS" -gt 8 ]]; then
    COMPILE_JOBS=8
 fi
 
+SILENT=''
+
 until [ -z "$1" ]; do
     case $1 in
         "--qt-config")
@@ -50,12 +52,17 @@ until [ -z "$1" ]; do
         "--confirm")
             BUILD_CONFIRM=1
             shift;;
+        "--silent")
+            SILENT='--silent'
+            QT_CFG+=" -silent"
+            shift;;
         "--help")
             echo "Usage: $0 [--qt-config CONFIG] [--jobs NUM]"
             echo
             echo "  --confirm                   Silently confirm the build."
             echo "  --qt-config CONFIG          Specify extra config options to be used when configuring Qt"
             echo "  --jobs NUM                  How many parallel compile jobs to use. Defaults to 4."
+            echo "  --silent                    Produce less verbose output."
             echo
             exit 0
             ;;
@@ -89,6 +96,20 @@ EOF
     echo
 fi
 
-cd src/qt && ./preconfig.sh --jobs $COMPILE_JOBS --qt-config "$QT_CFG" && cd ../..
+echo
+echo "Building PhantomJS. Please wait..."
+echo
+
+UNAME_SYSTEM=`(uname -s) 2>/dev/null`  || UNAME_SYSTEM=unknown
+UNAME_RELEASE=`(uname -r) 2>/dev/null` || UNAME_RELEASE=unknown
+UNAME_MACHINE=`(uname -m) 2>/dev/null` || UNAME_MACHINE=unknown
+
+echo "System architecture... ($UNAME_SYSTEM $UNAME_RELEASE $UNAME_MACHINE)"
+echo
+
+cd src/qt && ./preconfig.sh --jobs $COMPILE_JOBS --qt-config "$QT_CFG" $SILENT && cd ../..
+
+echo "Building main PhantomJS application. Please wait..."
+echo
 src/qt/bin/qmake $QMAKE_ARGS
 make -j$COMPILE_JOBS
diff --git a/src/qt/preconfig.sh b/src/qt/preconfig.sh
index 7cfafa08..e573d7ed 100755
--- a/src/qt/preconfig.sh
+++ b/src/qt/preconfig.sh
@@ -78,6 +78,8 @@ QT_CFG+=' -D QT_NO_STYLE_CLEANLOOKS'
 QT_CFG+=' -D QT_NO_STYLE_MOTIF'
 QT_CFG+=' -D QT_NO_STYLE_PLASTIQUE'
 
+SILENT=''
+
 until [ -z "$1" ]; do
     case $1 in
         "--qt-config")
@@ -88,11 +90,16 @@ until [ -z "$1" ]; do
             shift
             COMPILE_JOBS=$1
             shift;;
+        "--silent")
+            SILENT='-s'
+            QT_CFG+=" -silent"
+            shift;;
         "--help")
             echo "Usage: $0 [--qt-config CONFIG] [--jobs NUM]"
             echo
             echo "  --qt-config CONFIG          Specify extra config options to be used when configuring Qt"
             echo "  --jobs NUM                  How many parallel compile jobs to use. Defaults to 4."
+            echo "  --silent                    Produce less verbose output."
             echo
             exit 0
             ;;
@@ -106,10 +113,18 @@ done
 # For parallelizing the bootstrapping process, e.g. qmake and friends.
 export MAKEFLAGS=-j$COMPILE_JOBS
 
-./configure -prefix $PWD $QT_CFG
-make -j$COMPILE_JOBS
+if [ -z "$SILENT" ]; then
+    ./configure -prefix $PWD $QT_CFG
+else
+    echo "Setting up Qt. Please wait..."
+    ./configure -prefix $PWD $QT_CFG &> /dev/null
+fi
+
+echo
+echo "Building Qt and WebKit. Please wait..."
+make -j$COMPILE_JOBS $SILENT
 
 # Build text codecs
 pushd src/plugins/codecs/
-make -j$COMPILE_JOBS
+make -j$COMPILE_JOBS $SILENT
 popd