diff --git a/docs/source/format/IPC.rst b/docs/source/format/IPC.rst
index 16567a6744e..88cab8a288c 100644
--- a/docs/source/format/IPC.rst
+++ b/docs/source/format/IPC.rst
@@ -24,13 +24,17 @@ Encapsulated message format
 Data components in the stream and file formats are represented as encapsulated
 *messages* consisting of:
 
-* A length prefix indicating the metadata size
+* A 32-bit continuation indicator. The value `0xFFFFFFFF` indicates a valid
+  message. This component was introduced in version 0.15.0 in part to address
+  the 8-byte alignment requirement of Flatbuffers
+* A 32-bit little-endian length prefix indicating the metadata size
 * The message metadata as a `Flatbuffer`_
 * Padding bytes to an 8-byte boundary
 * The message body, which must be a multiple of 8 bytes
 
 Schematically, we have: ::
 
+    <continuation: 0xFFFFFFFF>
     <metadata_size: int32>
     <metadata_flatbuffer: bytes>
     <padding>
@@ -79,14 +83,15 @@ in a ``RecordBatch`` it should be defined in a ``DictionaryBatch``. ::
     <DICTIONARY y DELTA>
     ...
     <RECORD BATCH n - 1>
-    <EOS [optional]: int32>
+    <EOS [optional]: 0x0000000000000000>
 
-When a stream reader implementation is reading a stream, after each message, it
-may read the next 4 bytes to know how large the message metadata that follows
-is. Once the message flatbuffer is read, you can then read the message body.
+When a stream reader implementation is reading a stream, after each
+message, it may read the next 8 bytes to determine both if the stream
+continues and the size of the message metadata that follows. Once the
+message flatbuffer is read, you can then read the message body.
 
-The stream writer can signal end-of-stream (EOS) either by writing a 0 length
-as an ``int32`` or simply closing the stream interface.
+The stream writer can signal end-of-stream (EOS) either by writing 8
+zero (`0x00`) bytes or closing the stream interface.
 
 File format
 -----------
@@ -219,8 +224,8 @@ take the form: ::
 Tensor (Multi-dimensional Array) Message Format
 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
 
-The ``Tensor`` message types provides a way to write a multidimensional array of
-fixed-size values (such as a NumPy ndarray) using Arrow's shared memory
+The ``Tensor`` message types provides a way to write a multidimensional array
+of fixed-size values (such as a NumPy ndarray) using Arrow's shared memory
 tools. Arrow implementations in general are not required to implement this data
 format, though we provide a reference implementation in C++.