diff --git a/lib/ModelingToolkitBase/Project.toml b/lib/ModelingToolkitBase/Project.toml
index 2e410d7061..c2e4860567 100644
--- a/lib/ModelingToolkitBase/Project.toml
+++ b/lib/ModelingToolkitBase/Project.toml
@@ -146,6 +146,7 @@ NaNMath = "0.3, 1"
 NonlinearSolve = "4.19"
 NonlinearSolveBase = "2.31"
 OffsetArrays = "1.11"
+Optimization = "5.5"
 OptimizationBase = "5"
 OptimizationIpopt = "1"
 OptimizationOptimJL = "0.4"
diff --git a/lib/ModelingToolkitBase/test/qa/aqua.jl b/lib/ModelingToolkitBase/test/qa/aqua.jl
index f8933a775d..7bbb4d629d 100644
--- a/lib/ModelingToolkitBase/test/qa/aqua.jl
+++ b/lib/ModelingToolkitBase/test/qa/aqua.jl
@@ -1,4 +1,6 @@
 using ModelingToolkitBase
 using Aqua
 
-Aqua.test_all(ModelingToolkitBase)
+# This is loaded only by MTKBifurcationKitExt, while remaining a hard dependency so
+# loading BifurcationKit alone still activates the extension.
+Aqua.test_all(ModelingToolkitBase; stale_deps = (; ignore = [:SimpleNonlinearSolve]))