diff --git a/pkg/machine/e2e/init_test.go b/pkg/machine/e2e/init_test.go
index f9d8a6faa29..5ce0e55b6f5 100644
--- a/pkg/machine/e2e/init_test.go
+++ b/pkg/machine/e2e/init_test.go
@@ -257,6 +257,30 @@ var _ = Describe("podman machine init", func() {
 		Expect(err).ToNot(HaveOccurred())
 		Expect(sshSession).To(Exit(0))
 		Expect(sshSession.outputToString()).To(ContainSubstring("yes"))
+
+		/* Validate that subid count is sufficiently large.
+		 * The subid and subgid files contain a line for each user with subid start and count,
+		 * separated by a double colon, for example: 'user:100000:65536'. Only the count is of
+		 * interest here, it should be sufficiently large to accommodate nested namespaces which is
+		 * required to run rootless Podman in Podman. The check assumes there is only 1 user.
+		 */
+		count_min := 1000000
+		for _, file := range []string{"/etc/subuid", "/etc/subgid"} {
+			cmd := fmt.Sprintf(`awk -F: 'NR==1 {print $NF}' %s`, file)
+			sshSession, err := mb.setName(mb.name).setCmd(ssh.withSSHCommand([]string{cmd})).run()
+			Expect(err).ToNot(HaveOccurred())
+			Expect(sshSession).To(Exit(0))
+
+			subid_count_str := sshSession.outputToString()
+			Expect(subid_count_str).ToNot(BeEmpty(), "No subid count found in %s", file)
+
+			subid_count, err := strconv.Atoi(subid_count_str)
+			Expect(err).ToNot(HaveOccurred())
+			Expect(subid_count).To(BeNumerically(">=", count_min),
+				"Expected subid count %d to be >= %d in %s",
+				subid_count, count_min, file,
+			)
+		}
 	})
 
 	It("machine init with cpus, disk size, memory, timezone", func() {
diff --git a/pkg/machine/wsl/declares.go b/pkg/machine/wsl/declares.go
index b4cf752232c..f077b058bad 100644
--- a/pkg/machine/wsl/declares.go
+++ b/pkg/machine/wsl/declares.go
@@ -34,6 +34,8 @@ ln -fs /dev/null /etc/systemd/system/systemd-oomd.socket
 mkdir -p /etc/systemd/system/systemd-sysusers.service.d/
 echo CREATE_MAIL_SPOOL=no >> /etc/default/useradd
 adduser -m [USER] -G wheel
+sed -ir 's/65536/1000000/' /etc/subuid
+sed -ir 's/65536/1000000/' /etc/subgid
 mkdir -p /home/[USER]/.config/systemd/[USER]/
 chown [USER]:[USER] /home/[USER]/.config
 `