diff --git a/requirements.txt b/requirements.txt
index 945d29d4d46..2a94f6db6c8 100644
--- a/requirements.txt
+++ b/requirements.txt
@@ -1,5 +1,6 @@
 # Requirements for building PEPs with Sphinx
-Pygments >= 2.9.0
+# Sphinx requires >= 2.17. JSON5 support added in 2.19
+Pygments >= 2.19
 # Sphinx 6.1.0 broke copying images in parallel builds; fixed in 6.1.2
 # See https://github.com/sphinx-doc/sphinx/pull/11100
 Sphinx >= 5.1.1, != 6.1.0, != 6.1.1, < 8.1.0