diff --git a/srcpkgs/octave/template b/srcpkgs/octave/template
index 12c9eb50fc4..2ccd93afee9 100644
--- a/srcpkgs/octave/template
+++ b/srcpkgs/octave/template
@@ -1,6 +1,6 @@
 # Template file for 'octave'
 pkgname=octave
-version=9.3.0
+version=9.4.0
 revision=1
 build_style=gnu-configure
 build_helper=qmake6
@@ -8,7 +8,7 @@ configure_args="--disable-docs"
 hostmakedepends="perl gcc-fortran pkg-config qt6-base qt6-tools"
 makedepends="pcre2-devel readline-devel libSM-devel libltdl-devel lcms2-devel
  glpk-devel SuiteSparse-devel rapidjson arpack-ng-devel libsndfile-devel
- portaudio-devel libcurl-devel fftw-devel libgraphicsmagick-devel
+ portaudio-devel libcurl-devel fftw-devel hdf5-devel libgraphicsmagick-devel
  qt6-base-devel qt6-tools-devel qt6-qt5compat-devel qt6-plugin-sqlite
  qscintilla-qt6-devel glu-devel fltk-devel fontconfig-devel freetype-devel
  gl2ps-devel libgomp-devel libqhull-devel zlib-devel"
@@ -20,7 +20,7 @@ license="GPL-3.0-or-later"
 homepage="https://octave.org/"
 changelog="http://hg.savannah.gnu.org/hgweb/octave/raw-file/default/etc/NEWS.${version%%.*}.md"
 distfiles="${GNU_SITE}/octave/octave-${version}.tar.gz"
-checksum=809fa39a7acc84815bf4dc4d2d7e6b228ce75a07f3b2413f3313aa8e0aaa3287
+checksum=da9481205bfa717660b7d4a16732d8b2d58aadceab4993d41242a8e2848ea6c1
 
 # Use OpenBLAS on platforms where it is available and fallback to regular BLAS
 # on all others.
@@ -35,11 +35,6 @@ case "$XBPS_TARGET_MACHINE" in
 		;;
 esac
 
-if [ -z "$CROSS_BUILD" ]; then
-	# hdf5 is nocross
-	makedepends+=" hdf5-devel"
-fi
-
 if [ -n "$CROSS_BUILD" ];then
 	# cross build cannot determine integer size for BLAS
 	# our BLAS (lapack and openblas) are built with 32 bit ints