diff --git a/airflow/www/views.py b/airflow/www/views.py
index 1596d86148cf3b..35bc35f2ffff06 100644
--- a/airflow/www/views.py
+++ b/airflow/www/views.py
@@ -2658,6 +2658,7 @@ def action_varexport(self, ids, session=None):
 
         response = make_response(json.dumps(var_dict, sort_keys=True, indent=4))
         response.headers["Content-Disposition"] = "attachment; filename=variables.json"
+        response.headers["Content-Type"] = "application/json; charset=utf-8"
         return response
 
     def on_form_prefill(self, form, id):
diff --git a/airflow/www_rbac/views.py b/airflow/www_rbac/views.py
index 6afbcb6d4c62c1..1d301e163d6cd9 100644
--- a/airflow/www_rbac/views.py
+++ b/airflow/www_rbac/views.py
@@ -2249,6 +2249,7 @@ def action_varexport(self, items):
 
         response = make_response(json.dumps(var_dict, sort_keys=True, indent=4))
         response.headers["Content-Disposition"] = "attachment; filename=variables.json"
+        response.headers["Content-Type"] = "application/json; charset=utf-8"
         return response
 
     @expose('/varimport', methods=["POST"])