diff -r 3ee15bd35902 Lib/test/test_range.py
--- a/Lib/test/test_range.py	Sat Oct 08 16:15:15 2016 +0300
+++ b/Lib/test/test_range.py	Sat Oct 08 20:08:29 2016 +0300
@@ -4,6 +4,7 @@
 import sys
 import pickle
 import itertools
+import test.support
 
 # pure Python implementations (3 args only), for comparison
 def pyrange(start, stop, step):
@@ -493,6 +494,38 @@
             test_id = "reversed(range({}, {}, {}))".format(start, end, step)
             self.assert_iterators_equal(iter1, iter2, test_id, limit=100)
 
+    @test.support.cpython_only
+    def test_range_iterator_invocation(self):
+        import _testcapi
+        rangeiter_type = type(iter(range(0)))
+
+        self.assertWarns(DeprecationWarning, rangeiter_type, 1, 3, 1)
+
+        with test.support.check_warnings(('', DeprecationWarning)):
+            # rangeiter_new doesn't take keyword arguments
+            with self.assertRaises(TypeError):
+                rangeiter_type(a=1)
+
+            # rangeiter_new takes exactly 3 arguments
+            self.assertRaises(TypeError, rangeiter_type)
+            self.assertRaises(TypeError, rangeiter_type, 1)
+            self.assertRaises(TypeError, rangeiter_type, 1, 1)
+            self.assertRaises(TypeError, rangeiter_type, 1, 1, 1, 1)
+
+            # start, stop and stop must fit in C long
+            for good_val in [_testcapi.LONG_MAX, _testcapi.LONG_MIN]:
+                rangeiter_type(good_val, good_val, good_val)
+            for bad_val in [_testcapi.LONG_MAX + 1, _testcapi.LONG_MIN - 1]:
+                self.assertRaises(OverflowError,
+                                  rangeiter_type, bad_val, 1, 1)
+                self.assertRaises(OverflowError,
+                                  rangeiter_type, 1, bad_val, 1)
+                self.assertRaises(OverflowError,
+                                  rangeiter_type, 1, 1, bad_val)
+
+            # step mustn't be zero
+            self.assertRaises(ValueError, rangeiter_type, 1, 1, 0)
+
     def test_slice(self):
         def check(start, stop, step=None):
             i = slice(start, stop, step)
diff -r 3ee15bd35902 Objects/rangeobject.c
--- a/Objects/rangeobject.c	Sat Oct 08 16:15:15 2016 +0300
+++ b/Objects/rangeobject.c	Sat Oct 08 20:08:29 2016 +0300
@@ -930,12 +930,27 @@
 {
     long start, stop, step;
 
-    if (!_PyArg_NoKeywords("rangeiter()", kw))
+    if (PyErr_WarnEx(PyExc_DeprecationWarning,
+                     "range_iterator(): creating instances of range_iterator "
+                     "by calling range_iterator type is deprecated",
+                     1)) {
         return NULL;
+    }
 
-    if (!PyArg_ParseTuple(args, "lll;rangeiter() requires 3 int arguments",
-                          &start, &stop, &step))
+    if (!_PyArg_NoKeywords("range_iterator()", kw)) {
         return NULL;
+    }
+
+    if (!PyArg_ParseTuple(args,
+                          "lll;range_iterator() requires 3 int arguments",
+                          &start, &stop, &step)) {
+        return NULL;
+    }
+    if (step == 0) {
+        PyErr_SetString(PyExc_ValueError,
+                        "range_iterator() arg 3 must not be zero");
+        return NULL;
+    }
 
     return fast_range_iter(start, stop, step);
 }