diff --git a/pyproject.toml b/pyproject.toml
index ed6b2f34861d05a9fde616e6fb9e782be3a17b14..68f20bcf7781ab0c694129477103984eecda4b60 100644
--- a/pyproject.toml
+++ b/pyproject.toml
@@ -1,6 +1,7 @@
 [build-system]
 requires = [
     #"wheel",
+    "setuptools",
     "Cython",
     "pysam",
     "pybedtools @ git+https://github.com/blaiseli/pybedtools.git@pep518",