diff --git a/pkgs/applications/editors/emacs/build-support/generic.nix b/pkgs/applications/editors/emacs/build-support/generic.nix
index 3ff10ee865fb..d22e6495c1d2 100644
--- a/pkgs/applications/editors/emacs/build-support/generic.nix
+++ b/pkgs/applications/editors/emacs/build-support/generic.nix
@@ -86,7 +86,7 @@ libBuildHelper.extendMkDerivation' stdenv.mkDerivation (finalAttrs:
     source ${./emacs-funcs.sh}
     addEmacsVars "$out"
 
-    find $out/share/emacs -type f -name '*.el' -print0 \
+    find $out/share/emacs -type f -name '*.el' -not -name ".dir-locals.el" -print0 \
       | xargs --verbose -0 -I {} -n 1 -P $NIX_BUILD_CORES sh -c \
           "emacs \
              --batch \