diff --git a/ixwebsocket/IXSocketServer.cpp b/ixwebsocket/IXSocketServer.cpp
index 31da31c2..a941371c 100644
--- a/ixwebsocket/IXSocketServer.cpp
+++ b/ixwebsocket/IXSocketServer.cpp
@@ -30,7 +30,9 @@ namespace ix
         _host(host),
         _backlog(backlog),
         _maxConnections(maxConnections),
+        _serverFd(-1),
         _stop(false),
+        _stopGc(false),
         _connectionStateFactory(&ConnectionState::createConnectionState)
     {
 
@@ -124,9 +126,15 @@ namespace ix
 
     void SocketServer::start()
     {
-        if (_thread.joinable()) return; // we've already been started
+        if (!_thread.joinable())
+        {
+            _thread = std::thread(&SocketServer::run, this);
+        }
 
-        _thread = std::thread(&SocketServer::run, this);
+        if (!_gcThread.joinable())
+        {
+            _gcThread = std::thread(&SocketServer::runGC, this);
+        }
     }
 
     void SocketServer::wait()
@@ -142,21 +150,21 @@ namespace ix
 
     void SocketServer::stop()
     {
-        while (true)
+        // Stop accepting connections, and close the 'accept' thread
+        if (_thread.joinable())
         {
-            if (closeTerminatedThreads()) break;
-
-            // wait 10ms and try again later.
-            // we could have a timeout, but if we exit of here
-            // we leaked threads, it is quite bad.
-            std::this_thread::sleep_for(std::chrono::milliseconds(10));
+            _stop = true;
+            _thread.join();
+            _stop = false;
         }
 
-        if (!_thread.joinable()) return; // nothing to do
-
-        _stop = true;
-        _thread.join();
-        _stop = false;
+        // Join all threads and make sure that all connections are terminated
+        if (_gcThread.joinable())
+        {
+            _stopGc = true;
+            _gcThread.join();
+            _stopGc = false;
+        }
 
         _conditionVariable.notify_one();
         Socket::closeSocket(_serverFd);
@@ -175,7 +183,7 @@ namespace ix
     // field becomes true, and we can use that to know that we can join that thread
     // and remove it from our _connectionsThreads data structure (a list).
     //
-    bool SocketServer::closeTerminatedThreads()
+    void SocketServer::closeTerminatedThreads()
     {
         std::lock_guard<std::mutex> lock(_connectionsThreadsMutex);
         auto it = _connectionsThreads.begin();
@@ -195,8 +203,6 @@ namespace ix
             if (thread.joinable()) thread.join();
             it = _connectionsThreads.erase(it);
         }
-
-        return _connectionsThreads.empty();
     }
 
     void SocketServer::run()
@@ -208,12 +214,6 @@ namespace ix
         {
             if (_stop) return;
 
-            // Garbage collection to shutdown/join threads for closed connections.
-            // We could run this in its own thread, so that we dont need to accept
-            // a new connection to close a thread.
-            // We could also use a condition variable to be notify when we need to do this
-            closeTerminatedThreads();
-
             // Use select to check whether a new connection is in progress
             fd_set rfds;
             struct timeval timeout;
@@ -290,5 +290,30 @@ namespace ix
                                 connectionState)));
         }
     }
+
+    size_t SocketServer::getConnectionsThreadsCount()
+    {
+        std::lock_guard<std::mutex> lock(_connectionsThreadsMutex);
+        return _connectionsThreads.size();
+    }
+
+    void SocketServer::runGC()
+    {
+        for (;;)
+        {
+            // Garbage collection to shutdown/join threads for closed connections.
+            closeTerminatedThreads();
+
+            // We quit this thread if all connections are closed and we received
+            // a stop request by setting _stopGc to true.
+            if (_stopGc && getConnectionsThreadsCount() == 0)
+            {
+                break;
+            }
+
+            // Sleep a little bit then keep cleaning up
+            std::this_thread::sleep_for(std::chrono::milliseconds(10));
+        }
+    }
 }
 
diff --git a/ixwebsocket/IXSocketServer.h b/ixwebsocket/IXSocketServer.h
index d5dfb492..0472e93c 100644
--- a/ixwebsocket/IXSocketServer.h
+++ b/ixwebsocket/IXSocketServer.h
@@ -74,6 +74,12 @@ namespace ix
         // background thread to wait for incoming connections
         std::atomic<bool> _stop;
         std::thread _thread;
+        void run();
+
+        // background thread to cleanup (join) terminated threads
+        std::atomic<bool> _stopGc;
+        std::thread _gcThread;
+        void runGC();
 
         // the list of (connectionState, threads) for each connections
         ConnectionThreads _connectionsThreads;
@@ -87,13 +93,12 @@ namespace ix
         // the factory to create ConnectionState objects
         ConnectionStateFactory _connectionStateFactory;
 
-        // Methods
-        void run();
         virtual void handleConnection(int fd,
                                       std::shared_ptr<ConnectionState> connectionState) = 0;
         virtual size_t getConnectedClientsCount() = 0;
 
         // Returns true if all connection threads are joined
-        bool closeTerminatedThreads();
+        void closeTerminatedThreads();
+        size_t getConnectionsThreadsCount();
     };
 }