diff --git a/.circleci/config.yml b/.circleci/config.yml
index 6f11c346045..3ae98253d3d 100644
--- a/.circleci/config.yml
+++ b/.circleci/config.yml
@@ -44,7 +44,7 @@ jobs:
             which python
             which pip
             pip install --upgrade pip setuptools wheel
-            pip install --upgrade --only-binary "numpy,scipy,dipy,statsmodels" -ve . -r requirements.txt -r requirements_testing.txt -r requirements_testing_extra.txt PyQt6
+            pip install --upgrade --only-binary "numpy,scipy,dipy,statsmodels" -ve .[test] PyQt6
             # 3D too slow on Apple's software renderer, and numba causes us problems
             pip uninstall -y vtk pyvista pyvistaqt numba
             mkdir -p test-results
diff --git a/azure-pipelines.yml b/azure-pipelines.yml
index 1b8ddc505a4..b3983d53823 100644
--- a/azure-pipelines.yml
+++ b/azure-pipelines.yml
@@ -52,7 +52,7 @@ stages:
           - bash: |
               set -eo pipefail
               python -m pip install --progress-bar off --upgrade pip setuptools wheel
-              python -m pip install --progress-bar off -r requirements_base.txt -r requirements_hdf5.txt -r requirements_testing.txt
+              python -m pip install --progress-bar off -ve .[hdf5,test_base]
               python -m pip uninstall -yq pytest-qt  # don't want to set up display, etc. for this
               pre-commit install --install-hooks
             displayName: Install dependencies
@@ -169,8 +169,7 @@ stages:
               python -m pip install --progress-bar off --upgrade pip setuptools wheel
               python -m pip install --progress-bar off --upgrade --pre --only-binary=\"numpy,scipy,matplotlib,vtk\" numpy scipy matplotlib vtk
               python -c "import vtk"
-              python -m pip install --progress-bar off --upgrade -r requirements.txt -r requirements_testing.txt -r requirements_testing_extra.txt
-              python -m pip install -e .
+              python -m pip install --progress-bar off --upgrade -ve .[test]
             displayName: 'Install dependencies with pip'
           - bash: |
               set -e
diff --git a/doc/development/contributing.rst b/doc/development/contributing.rst
index 2dbf90d306b..c378a8abe3b 100644
--- a/doc/development/contributing.rst
+++ b/doc/development/contributing.rst
@@ -304,11 +304,11 @@ be reflected the next time you open a Python interpreter and ``import mne``
 Finally, we'll add a few dependencies that are not needed for running
 MNE-Python, but are needed for locally running our test suite::
 
-    $ pip install -r requirements_testing.txt
+    $ pip install -e .[test]
 
 And for building our documentation::
 
-    $ pip install -r requirements_doc.txt
+    $ pip install -e .[doc]
     $ conda install graphviz
 
 .. note::
diff --git a/doc/links.inc b/doc/links.inc
index 388144d3ddf..b84e046a6be 100644
--- a/doc/links.inc
+++ b/doc/links.inc
@@ -111,7 +111,6 @@
 
 .. installation links
 
-.. _requirements file:  https://raw.githubusercontent.com/mne-tools/mne-python/main/requirements.txt
 .. _NVIDIA CUDA GPU processing: https://developer.nvidia.com/cuda-zone
 .. _NVIDIA proprietary drivers: https://www.geforce.com/drivers
 
diff --git a/tools/azure_dependencies.sh b/tools/azure_dependencies.sh
index d3ce1a98119..f9af160a406 100755
--- a/tools/azure_dependencies.sh
+++ b/tools/azure_dependencies.sh
@@ -3,7 +3,7 @@
 STD_ARGS="--progress-bar off --upgrade"
 if [ "${TEST_MODE}" == "pip" ]; then
 	python -m pip install --upgrade pip setuptools wheel
-	python -m pip install --upgrade --only-binary="numba,llvmlite,numpy,scipy,vtk" -r requirements.txt
+	python -m pip install --upgrade --only-binary="numba,llvmlite,numpy,scipy,vtk" -ve .[full]
 elif [ "${TEST_MODE}" == "pip-pre" ]; then
 	STD_ARGS="$STD_ARGS --pre"
 	python -m pip install $STD_ARGS pip setuptools wheel packaging setuptools_scm
diff --git a/tools/circleci_dependencies.sh b/tools/circleci_dependencies.sh
index 677bd5ced22..36bae8d0bc1 100755
--- a/tools/circleci_dependencies.sh
+++ b/tools/circleci_dependencies.sh
@@ -1,4 +1,4 @@
 #!/bin/bash -ef
 
 python -m pip install --upgrade "pip!=20.3.0" setuptools wheel
-python -m pip install --upgrade --progress-bar off --only-binary "numpy,scipy,matplotlib,pandas,statsmodels" -r requirements.txt -r requirements_testing.txt -r requirements_doc.txt PyQt6 git+https://github.com/mne-tools/mne-qt-browser -e .
+python -m pip install --upgrade --progress-bar off --only-binary "numpy,scipy,matplotlib,pandas,statsmodels" PyQt6 git+https://github.com/mne-tools/mne-qt-browser -ve .[full,test_base,doc]
diff --git a/tools/generate_codemeta.py b/tools/generate_codemeta.py
index e547261dc4d..694b87ae381 100644
--- a/tools/generate_codemeta.py
+++ b/tools/generate_codemeta.py
@@ -108,18 +108,21 @@ def parse_name(name):
 
 
 # GET OUR DEPENDENCY VERSIONS
-with open(out_dir / "setup.py", "r") as fid:
-    for line in fid:
-        if line.strip().startswith("python_requires="):
-            version = line.strip().split("=", maxsplit=1)[1].strip("'\",")
-            dependencies = [f"python{version}"]
-            break
-with open(out_dir / "requirements.txt", "r") as fid:
-    for line in fid:
-        req = line.strip()
-        for hard_dep in hard_dependencies:
-            if req.startswith(hard_dep):
-                dependencies.append(req)
+#
+# TODO this needs to be fixed
+#
+# with open(out_dir / "setup.py", "r") as fid:
+#     for line in fid:
+#         if line.strip().startswith("python_requires="):
+#             version = line.strip().split("=", maxsplit=1)[1].strip("'\",")
+#             dependencies = [f"python{version}"]
+#             break
+# with open(out_dir / "requirements.txt", "r") as fid:
+#     for line in fid:
+#         req = line.strip()
+#         for hard_dep in hard_dependencies:
+#             if req.startswith(hard_dep):
+#                 dependencies.append(req)
 
 
 # these must be done outside the boilerplate (no \n allowed in f-strings):
diff --git a/tools/github_actions_dependencies.sh b/tools/github_actions_dependencies.sh
index c5f4dd0ea7e..6cc96ac6af3 100755
--- a/tools/github_actions_dependencies.sh
+++ b/tools/github_actions_dependencies.sh
@@ -58,14 +58,14 @@ echo ""
 # for compat_minimal and compat_old, we don't want to --upgrade
 if [ ! -z "$CONDA_DEPENDENCIES" ]; then
 	echo "Installing dependencies for conda"
-	python -m pip install -r requirements_base.txt -r requirements_testing.txt
+	python -m pip install -ve .[test_base]
 else
 	echo "Installing dependencies using pip"
-	python -m pip install $STD_ARGS -r requirements_base.txt -r requirements_testing.txt -r requirements_hdf5.txt
+	python -m pip install $STD_ARGS -ve .[hdf5,test_base]
 fi
 echo ""
 
 if [ "${DEPS}" != "minimal" ]; then
 	echo "Installing non-minimal dependencies"
-	python -m pip install $STD_ARGS -r requirements_testing_extra.txt
+	python -m pip install $STD_ARGS -ve .[test]
 fi