diff --git a/gst-libs/gst/tag/meson.build b/gst-libs/gst/tag/meson.build
index 5ec3739..a6cff8d 100644
--- a/gst-libs/gst/tag/meson.build
+++ b/gst-libs/gst/tag/meson.build
@@ -70,7 +70,7 @@ endif
 core_conf.set('HAVE_ISO_CODES', have_iso_codes)
 
 # could drop optional zlib dep and use g_zlib_decompressor_new()
-zlib_dep = dependency('zlib', required : false)
+zlib_dep = dependency('zlib', required : true)
 if not zlib_dep.found()
   zlib_dep = cc.find_library('z', required : false)
   if not zlib_dep.found() or not cc.has_header('zlib.h')