diff --git a/spacy/tests/conftest.py b/spacy/tests/conftest.py
index 55166cc46..dac0669f1 100644
--- a/spacy/tests/conftest.py
+++ b/spacy/tests/conftest.py
@@ -13,8 +13,11 @@ from ..hu import Hungarian
 from ..tokens import Doc
 from ..strings import StringStore
 from ..attrs import ORTH, TAG, HEAD, DEP
+from ..util import match_best_version, get_data_path
 
 from io import StringIO
+from pathlib import Path
+import os
 import pytest
 
 
@@ -68,6 +71,14 @@ def text_file():
     return StringIO()
 
 
+@pytest.fixture
+def path():
+    if 'SPACY_DATA' in os.environ:
+        return Path(os.environ['SPACY_DATA'])
+    else:
+        return match_best_version('en', None, get_data_path())
+
+
 # only used for tests that require loading the models
 # in all other cases, use specific instances
 @pytest.fixture(scope="session")