diff --git a/meta/recipes-devtools/python/python3-requests_2.34.2.bb b/meta/recipes-devtools/python/python3-requests_2.34.2.bb
index 8230e8ce43b2..9e7dc14f6a84 100644
--- a/meta/recipes-devtools/python/python3-requests_2.34.2.bb
+++ b/meta/recipes-devtools/python/python3-requests_2.34.2.bb
@@ -17,7 +17,6 @@ do_install:append:class-nativesdk() {
 
 RDEPENDS:${PN} += "\
     python3-certifi \
-    python3-chardet \
     python3-compression \
     python3-email \
     python3-idna \
@@ -27,6 +26,13 @@ RDEPENDS:${PN} += "\
     python3-urllib3 \
 "
 
+# Requests 2.26 added charset-normalizer as an alternative to chardet, since
+# 2.28 it is the default and chardet is the option. 2.32 makes both of them
+# optional to minimise footprint, falling back to UTF-8.
+PACKAGECONFIG ?= "chardet"
+PACKAGECONFIG[chardet] = ",,,python3-chardet"
+PACKAGECONFIG[charset-normalizer] = ",,,python3-charset-normalizer"
+
 FILES:${PN}:append:class-nativesdk = " ${SDKPATHNATIVE}/environment-setup.d/python3-requests.sh"
 
 CVE_PRODUCT = "requests"