diff --git a/CHANGELOG.md b/CHANGELOG.md
index 048e35cf0bf..03c5a9e2996 100644
--- a/CHANGELOG.md
+++ b/CHANGELOG.md
@@ -84,6 +84,7 @@ To learn more about active deprecations, we recommend checking [GitHub Discussio
 - **Elasticsearch Scaler**: Add HTTP status check for Elasticsearch errors ([#7480](https://github.com/kedacore/keda/pull/7480))
 - **Github Runner Scaler**: Handle rate limit errors by respecting X-RateLimit-Reset and Retry-After headers and returning cached queue length ([#7683](https://github.com/kedacore/keda/issues/7683))
 - **Kubernetes Workload Scaler**: Add `groupByNode` parameter ([#7628](https://github.com/kedacore/keda/issues/7628))
+- **Metrics API Scaler**: Add custom HTTP client timeout ([#7549](https://github.com/kedacore/keda/issues/7549))
 - **MSSQL Scaler**: Add Azure Workload Identity support for Azure SQL authentication ([#6104](https://github.com/kedacore/keda/issues/6104))
 
 ### Fixes
diff --git a/pkg/scalers/metrics_api_scaler.go b/pkg/scalers/metrics_api_scaler.go
index 56eb802520c..792a3b73e7e 100644
--- a/pkg/scalers/metrics_api_scaler.go
+++ b/pkg/scalers/metrics_api_scaler.go
@@ -12,6 +12,7 @@ import (
 	"strconv"
 	"strings"
 	"sync"
+	"time"
 
 	"github.com/go-logr/logr"
 	"github.com/prometheus/common/expfmt"
@@ -48,6 +49,7 @@ type metricsAPIScalerMetadata struct {
 	UnsafeSsl                         bool            `keda:"name=unsafeSsl,order=triggerMetadata,default=false"`
 	AggregateFromKubeServiceEndpoints bool            `keda:"name=aggregateFromKubeServiceEndpoints,order=triggerMetadata,default=false"`
 	AggregationType                   AggregationType `keda:"name=aggregationType,order=triggerMetadata,default=average,enum=average;sum;max;min"`
+	Timeout                           time.Duration   `keda:"name=timeout, order=triggerMetadata, optional"`
 	// Authentication parameters for connecting to the metrics API
 	MetricsAPIAuth *authentication.Config `keda:"optional"`
 
@@ -93,7 +95,13 @@ func NewMetricsAPIScaler(config *scalersconfig.ScalerConfig, kubeClient client.C
 		return nil, fmt.Errorf("error parsing metric API metadata: %w", err)
 	}
 
-	httpClient := kedautil.CreateHTTPClient(config.GlobalHTTPTimeout, meta.UnsafeSsl)
+	// handle HTTP client timeout
+	httpClientTimeout := config.GlobalHTTPTimeout
+	if meta.Timeout > 0 {
+		httpClientTimeout = meta.Timeout
+	}
+
+	httpClient := kedautil.CreateHTTPClient(httpClientTimeout, meta.UnsafeSsl)
 
 	// Handle TLS configuration with authentication config
 	if meta.MetricsAPIAuth != nil && meta.MetricsAPIAuth.EnabledTLS() {
diff --git a/pkg/scalers/metrics_api_scaler_test.go b/pkg/scalers/metrics_api_scaler_test.go
index 8a4141672e6..de214dabe19 100644
--- a/pkg/scalers/metrics_api_scaler_test.go
+++ b/pkg/scalers/metrics_api_scaler_test.go
@@ -38,6 +38,12 @@ var testMetricsAPIMetadata = []metricsAPIMetadataTestData{
 	{metadata: map[string]string{"valueLocation": "metric", "targetValue": "aa"}, raisesError: true},
 	// Missing targetValue
 	{metadata: map[string]string{"url": "http://dummy:1230/api/v1/", "valueLocation": "metric"}, raisesError: true},
+	// Valid HTTP timeout
+	{metadata: map[string]string{"url": "http://dummy:1230/api/v1/", "valueLocation": "metric", "targetValue": "42", "timeout": "1000"}, raisesError: false},
+	// Invalid - negative - HTTP timeout
+	{metadata: map[string]string{"url": "http://dummy:1230/api/v1/", "valueLocation": "metric", "targetValue": "42", "timeout": "-1"}, raisesError: true},
+	// Invalid - not a number - HTTP timeout
+	{metadata: map[string]string{"url": "http://dummy:1230/api/v1/", "valueLocation": "metric", "targetValue": "42", "timeout": "a"}, raisesError: true},
 }
 
 type metricAPIAuthMetadataTestData struct {
diff --git a/schema/generated/scalers-schema.json b/schema/generated/scalers-schema.json
index 6441ad1f147..c46a440d7c8 100644
--- a/schema/generated/scalers-schema.json
+++ b/schema/generated/scalers-schema.json
@@ -3096,6 +3096,12 @@
                         "min"
                     ],
                     "metadataVariableReadable": true
+                },
+                {
+                    "name": "timeout",
+                    "type": "string",
+                    "optional": true,
+                    "metadataVariableReadable": true
                 }
             ]
         },
diff --git a/schema/generated/scalers-schema.yaml b/schema/generated/scalers-schema.yaml
index b99c434a54e..89017851755 100644
--- a/schema/generated/scalers-schema.yaml
+++ b/schema/generated/scalers-schema.yaml
@@ -2024,6 +2024,10 @@ scalers:
             - max
             - min
           metadataVariableReadable: true
+        - name: timeout
+          type: string
+          optional: true
+          metadataVariableReadable: true
     - type: mongodb
       parameters:
         - name: connectionString