diff --git a/.github/workflows/ubuntu-tests.yml b/.github/workflows/ubuntu-tests.yml
index 63863bbc1..0f58a2f40 100644
--- a/.github/workflows/ubuntu-tests.yml
+++ b/.github/workflows/ubuntu-tests.yml
@@ -33,7 +33,7 @@ jobs:
     - name: Install dependencies
       run: |
         python -m pip install --upgrade pip
-        pip install -r requirements.txt
+        pip install .[hf-embed]
 
     - name: Run tests
       run: |
diff --git a/.github/workflows/windows-tests.yml b/.github/workflows/windows-tests.yml
index c17c67fb4..5d5c0d0ae 100644
--- a/.github/workflows/windows-tests.yml
+++ b/.github/workflows/windows-tests.yml
@@ -33,7 +33,7 @@ jobs:
     - name: Install dependencies
       run: |
         python -m pip install --upgrade pip
-        pip install -r requirements.txt
+        pip install .[hf-embed]
 
     - name: Run tests
       run: |
diff --git a/aider/help.py b/aider/help.py
index 69659bae5..bc93a6250 100755
--- a/aider/help.py
+++ b/aider/help.py
@@ -110,9 +110,8 @@ class Help:
         if pip_install:
             utils.pip_install(pip_install_cmd)
 
-        from llama_index.core import Settings
-
         try:
+            from llama_index.core import Settings
             from llama_index.embeddings.huggingface import HuggingFaceEmbedding
         except ImportError:
             raise PipInstallHF(pip_install_error)
diff --git a/docker/Dockerfile b/docker/Dockerfile
index 17c977961..282ba492b 100644
--- a/docker/Dockerfile
+++ b/docker/Dockerfile
@@ -7,7 +7,7 @@ RUN apt-get update && \
 COPY . /aider
 
 RUN    pip install --no-cache-dir /aider
-RUN    pip install --no-cache-dir /aider[hf] --extra-index-url https://download.pytorch.org/whl/cpu
+RUN    pip install --no-cache-dir /aider[hf-embed] --extra-index-url https://download.pytorch.org/whl/cpu
 
 # Final stage
 FROM python:3.10-slim
diff --git a/requirements-hf-embed.in b/requirements-hf-embed.in
index 15ae10a73..a7994b070 100644
--- a/requirements-hf-embed.in
+++ b/requirements-hf-embed.in
@@ -3,6 +3,7 @@
 #    pip-compile --output-file=requirements-hf.txt requirements-hf.in --upgrade
 #
 
+llama-index-core
 llama-index-embeddings-huggingface
 
 # To retain python 3.9 compatibility
diff --git a/requirements-hf-embed.txt b/requirements-hf-embed.txt
index c3d824033..1ec6e92f9 100644
--- a/requirements-hf-embed.txt
+++ b/requirements-hf-embed.txt
@@ -2,7 +2,7 @@
 # This file is autogenerated by pip-compile with Python 3.12
 # by the following command:
 #
-#    pip-compile --output-file=requirements-hf.txt requirements-hf.in
+#    pip-compile --output-file=requirements-hf-embed.txt requirements-hf-embed.in
 #
 aiohttp==3.9.5
     # via
@@ -41,17 +41,11 @@ click==8.1.7
     #   -c requirements.txt
     #   nltk
 dataclasses-json==0.6.7
-    # via
-    #   -c requirements.txt
-    #   llama-index-core
+    # via llama-index-core
 deprecated==1.2.14
-    # via
-    #   -c requirements.txt
-    #   llama-index-core
+    # via llama-index-core
 dirtyjson==1.0.8
-    # via
-    #   -c requirements.txt
-    #   llama-index-core
+    # via llama-index-core
 distro==1.9.0
     # via
     #   -c requirements.txt
@@ -111,27 +105,22 @@ jinja2==3.1.4
     #   torch
 joblib==1.4.2
     # via
-    #   -c requirements.txt
     #   nltk
     #   scikit-learn
 llama-cloud==0.0.6
-    # via
-    #   -c requirements.txt
-    #   llama-index-core
+    # via llama-index-core
 llama-index-core==0.10.52.post2
     # via
-    #   -c requirements.txt
+    #   -r requirements-hf-embed.in
     #   llama-index-embeddings-huggingface
 llama-index-embeddings-huggingface==0.2.2
-    # via -r requirements-hf.in
+    # via -r requirements-hf-embed.in
 markupsafe==2.1.5
     # via
     #   -c requirements.txt
     #   jinja2
 marshmallow==3.21.3
-    # via
-    #   -c requirements.txt
-    #   dataclasses-json
+    # via dataclasses-json
 minijinja==2.0.1
     # via huggingface-hub
 mpmath==1.3.0
@@ -142,22 +131,16 @@ multidict==6.0.5
     #   aiohttp
     #   yarl
 mypy-extensions==1.0.0
-    # via
-    #   -c requirements.txt
-    #   typing-inspect
+    # via typing-inspect
 nest-asyncio==1.6.0
-    # via
-    #   -c requirements.txt
-    #   llama-index-core
+    # via llama-index-core
 networkx==3.2.1
     # via
     #   -c requirements.txt
     #   llama-index-core
     #   torch
 nltk==3.8.1
-    # via
-    #   -c requirements.txt
-    #   llama-index-core
+    # via llama-index-core
 numpy==1.26.4
     # via
     #   -c requirements.txt
@@ -228,7 +211,7 @@ scikit-learn==1.5.1
     # via sentence-transformers
 scipy==1.13.1
     # via
-    #   -r requirements-hf.in
+    #   -r requirements-hf-embed.in
     #   scikit-learn
     #   sentence-transformers
 sentence-transformers==3.0.1
@@ -245,7 +228,6 @@ sniffio==1.3.1
     #   openai
 sqlalchemy[asyncio]==2.0.31
     # via
-    #   -c requirements.txt
     #   llama-index-core
     #   sqlalchemy
 sympy==1.13.0
@@ -290,7 +272,6 @@ typing-extensions==4.12.2
     #   typing-inspect
 typing-inspect==0.9.0
     # via
-    #   -c requirements.txt
     #   dataclasses-json
     #   llama-index-core
 tzdata==2024.1
@@ -303,7 +284,6 @@ urllib3==2.2.2
     #   requests
 wrapt==1.16.0
     # via
-    #   -c requirements.txt
     #   deprecated
     #   llama-index-core
 yarl==1.9.4
diff --git a/requirements.in b/requirements.in
index 1ba1f37c9..3fedaa2b6 100644
--- a/requirements.in
+++ b/requirements.in
@@ -26,7 +26,6 @@ google-generativeai
 streamlit
 watchdog
 flake8
-llama-index-core
 importlib_resources
 
 # v3.3 no longer works on python 3.9
diff --git a/requirements.txt b/requirements.txt
index d674612cb..fe7480c74 100644
--- a/requirements.txt
+++ b/requirements.txt
@@ -5,9 +5,7 @@
 #    pip-compile requirements.in
 #
 aiohttp==3.9.5
-    # via
-    #   litellm
-    #   llama-index-core
+    # via litellm
 aiosignal==1.3.1
     # via aiohttp
 altair==5.3.0
@@ -47,18 +45,11 @@ charset-normalizer==3.3.2
 click==8.1.7
     # via
     #   litellm
-    #   nltk
     #   streamlit
 configargparse==1.7
     # via -r requirements.in
-dataclasses-json==0.6.7
-    # via llama-index-core
-deprecated==1.2.14
-    # via llama-index-core
 diff-match-patch==20230430
     # via -r requirements.in
-dirtyjson==1.0.8
-    # via llama-index-core
 diskcache==5.6.3
     # via -r requirements.in
 distro==1.9.0
@@ -72,9 +63,7 @@ frozenlist==1.4.1
     #   aiohttp
     #   aiosignal
 fsspec==2024.6.1
-    # via
-    #   huggingface-hub
-    #   llama-index-core
+    # via huggingface-hub
 gitdb==4.0.11
     # via gitpython
 gitpython==3.1.43
@@ -106,9 +95,7 @@ googleapis-common-protos==1.63.2
     #   google-api-core
     #   grpcio-status
 greenlet==3.0.3
-    # via
-    #   playwright
-    #   sqlalchemy
+    # via playwright
 grep-ast==0.3.2
     # via -r requirements.in
 grpcio==1.64.1
@@ -126,10 +113,7 @@ httplib2==0.22.0
     #   google-api-python-client
     #   google-auth-httplib2
 httpx==0.27.0
-    # via
-    #   llama-cloud
-    #   llama-index-core
-    #   openai
+    # via openai
 huggingface-hub==0.23.4
     # via tokenizers
 idna==3.7
@@ -149,8 +133,6 @@ jinja2==3.1.4
     #   altair
     #   litellm
     #   pydeck
-joblib==1.4.2
-    # via nltk
 jsonschema==4.22.0
     # via
     #   -r requirements.in
@@ -160,16 +142,10 @@ jsonschema-specifications==2023.12.1
     # via jsonschema
 litellm==1.41.6
     # via -r requirements.in
-llama-cloud==0.0.6
-    # via llama-index-core
-llama-index-core==0.10.52.post2
-    # via -r requirements.in
 markdown-it-py==3.0.0
     # via rich
 markupsafe==2.1.5
     # via jinja2
-marshmallow==3.21.3
-    # via dataclasses-json
 mccabe==0.7.0
     # via flake8
 mdurl==0.1.2
@@ -178,41 +154,27 @@ multidict==6.0.5
     # via
     #   aiohttp
     #   yarl
-mypy-extensions==1.0.0
-    # via typing-inspect
-nest-asyncio==1.6.0
-    # via llama-index-core
 networkx==3.2.1
-    # via
-    #   -r requirements.in
-    #   llama-index-core
-nltk==3.8.1
-    # via llama-index-core
+    # via -r requirements.in
 numpy==1.26.4
     # via
     #   -r requirements.in
     #   altair
-    #   llama-index-core
     #   pandas
     #   pyarrow
     #   pydeck
     #   streamlit
 openai==1.35.10
-    # via
-    #   -r requirements.in
-    #   litellm
-    #   llama-index-core
+    # via litellm
 packaging==24.1
     # via
     #   -r requirements.in
     #   altair
     #   huggingface-hub
-    #   marshmallow
     #   streamlit
 pandas==2.2.2
     # via
     #   altair
-    #   llama-index-core
     #   streamlit
 pathspec==0.12.1
     # via
@@ -221,7 +183,6 @@ pathspec==0.12.1
 pillow==10.4.0
     # via
     #   -r requirements.in
-    #   llama-index-core
     #   streamlit
 playwright==1.45.0
     # via -r requirements.in
@@ -256,7 +217,6 @@ pydantic==2.8.2
     # via
     #   google-generativeai
     #   litellm
-    #   llama-cloud
     #   openai
 pydantic-core==2.20.1
     # via pydantic
@@ -282,21 +242,17 @@ pyyaml==6.0.1
     # via
     #   -r requirements.in
     #   huggingface-hub
-    #   llama-index-core
 referencing==0.35.1
     # via
     #   jsonschema
     #   jsonschema-specifications
 regex==2024.5.15
-    # via
-    #   nltk
-    #   tiktoken
+    # via tiktoken
 requests==2.32.3
     # via
     #   google-api-core
     #   huggingface-hub
     #   litellm
-    #   llama-index-core
     #   streamlit
     #   tiktoken
 rich==13.7.1
@@ -324,21 +280,12 @@ soundfile==0.12.1
     # via -r requirements.in
 soupsieve==2.5
     # via beautifulsoup4
-sqlalchemy[asyncio]==2.0.31
-    # via
-    #   llama-index-core
-    #   sqlalchemy
 streamlit==1.36.0
     # via -r requirements.in
 tenacity==8.4.2
-    # via
-    #   llama-index-core
-    #   streamlit
+    # via streamlit
 tiktoken==0.7.0
-    # via
-    #   -r requirements.in
-    #   litellm
-    #   llama-index-core
+    # via litellm
 tokenizers==0.19.1
     # via litellm
 toml==0.10.2
@@ -351,8 +298,6 @@ tqdm==4.66.4
     # via
     #   google-generativeai
     #   huggingface-hub
-    #   llama-index-core
-    #   nltk
     #   openai
 tree-sitter==0.21.3
     # via
@@ -364,18 +309,11 @@ typing-extensions==4.12.2
     # via
     #   google-generativeai
     #   huggingface-hub
-    #   llama-index-core
     #   openai
     #   pydantic
     #   pydantic-core
     #   pyee
-    #   sqlalchemy
     #   streamlit
-    #   typing-inspect
-typing-inspect==0.9.0
-    # via
-    #   dataclasses-json
-    #   llama-index-core
 tzdata==2024.1
     # via pandas
 uritemplate==4.1.1
@@ -386,10 +324,6 @@ watchdog==4.0.1
     # via -r requirements.in
 wcwidth==0.2.13
     # via prompt-toolkit
-wrapt==1.16.0
-    # via
-    #   deprecated
-    #   llama-index-core
 yarl==1.9.4
     # via aiohttp
 zipp==3.19.2