diff --git a/lib/spack/spack/build_systems/meson.py b/lib/spack/spack/build_systems/meson.py
index 18a3d29ab50..675623e4f4d 100644
--- a/lib/spack/spack/build_systems/meson.py
+++ b/lib/spack/spack/build_systems/meson.py
@@ -48,6 +48,9 @@ class MesonPackage(spack.package_base.PackageBase):
         variant("strip", default=False, description="Strip targets on install")
         depends_on("meson", type="build")
         depends_on("ninja", type="build")
+        # Meson uses pkg-config for dependency detection, and this dependency is
+        # often overlooked by packages that use meson as a build system.
+        depends_on("pkgconfig", type="build")
         # Python detection in meson requires distutils to be importable, but distutils no longer
         # exists in Python 3.12. In Spack, we can't use setuptools as distutils replacement,
         # because the distutils-precedence.pth startup file that setuptools ships with is not run