diff --git a/package/exempi/Config.in b/package/exempi/Config.in
index ed71e0fb12..c9af219a20 100644
--- a/package/exempi/Config.in
+++ b/package/exempi/Config.in
@@ -4,6 +4,7 @@ config BR2_PACKAGE_EXEMPI
 	depends on BR2_INSTALL_LIBSTDCPP
 	depends on BR2_TOOLCHAIN_HAS_THREADS
 	select BR2_PACKAGE_EXPAT
+	select BR2_PACKAGE_LIBICONV if !BR2_ENABLE_LOCALE
 	select BR2_PACKAGE_ZLIB
 	help
 	  Exempi is an implementation of XMP (Extensible Metadata
diff --git a/package/exempi/exempi.mk b/package/exempi/exempi.mk
index e7b297ffe1..91b1d5da1f 100644
--- a/package/exempi/exempi.mk
+++ b/package/exempi/exempi.mk
@@ -9,7 +9,8 @@ EXEMPI_SOURCE = exempi-$(EXEMPI_VERSION).tar.bz2
 EXEMPI_SITE = https://libopenraw.freedesktop.org/download
 EXEMPI_INSTALL_STAGING = YES
 EXEMPI_CONF_OPTS = --disable-unittest
-EXEMPI_DEPENDENCIES = host-pkgconf expat zlib
+EXEMPI_DEPENDENCIES = host-pkgconf expat zlib \
+	$(if $(BR2_PACKAGE_LIBICONV),libiconv)
 EXEMPI_LICENSE = BSD-3-Clause
 EXEMPI_LICENSE_FILES = COPYING