diff --git a/Sphinxsetup.bat b/Sphinxsetup.bat
index 8d7f3754e3..222a77311a 100644
--- a/Sphinxsetup.bat
+++ b/Sphinxsetup.bat
@@ -2,7 +2,7 @@ rem remove any existing packages that may cause conflicts
 pip uninstall -y sphinx lxml sphinx-rtd-theme sphinxcontrib-youtube beautifulsoup4
 
 rem Install sphinx
-pip install --upgrade sphinx==7.1.2 docutils
+pip install --upgrade sphinx==7.1.2 "docutils<0.19"
 
 rem lxml for parameter parsing:
 pip install --upgrade lxml
diff --git a/Sphinxsetup.sh b/Sphinxsetup.sh
index 398ad682f7..0f321a2e6f 100755
--- a/Sphinxsetup.sh
+++ b/Sphinxsetup.sh
@@ -51,7 +51,7 @@ rm -f get-pip.py
 
 # Install python packages using known working versions
 # Install sphinx with a specific docutils version
-python3 -m pip install --user --upgrade sphinx==${SPHINX_VERSION} docutils
+python3 -m pip install --user --upgrade sphinx==${SPHINX_VERSION} "docutils<0.19"
 
 # lxml for parameter parsing:
 python3 -m pip install --user --upgrade lxml
diff --git a/update.py b/update.py
index 41d4a60a6e..8836c3ddd9 100755
--- a/update.py
+++ b/update.py
@@ -777,7 +777,7 @@ def check_imports():
     '''check key imports work'''
     import pkg_resources
     # package names to check the versions of. Note that these can be different than the string used to import the package
-    requires = ["sphinx_rtd_theme>=1.3.0", "sphinxcontrib.youtube>=1.2.0", "sphinx>=6.0.0", "docutils>=0.16"]
+    requires = ["sphinx_rtd_theme>=1.3.0", "sphinxcontrib.youtube>=1.2.0", "sphinx>=7.1.2", "docutils<0.19"]
     for r in requires:
         debug("Checking for %s" % r)
         try: