diff --git a/WORKSPACE b/WORKSPACE
index 08ed68ca..0b637541 100644
--- a/WORKSPACE
+++ b/WORKSPACE
@@ -1,6 +1,7 @@
 workspace(name = "org_orbax")
 
 load("@bazel_tools//tools/build_defs/repo:git.bzl", "git_repository")
+load("@bazel_tools//tools/build_defs/repo:http.bzl", "http_archive")
 
 git_repository(
     name = "bazel_skylib",
@@ -13,3 +14,10 @@ git_repository(
     remote = "https://github.com/bazelbuild/rules_python.git",
     tag = "0.5.0",
 )
+
+http_archive(
+    name = "com_google_absl",
+    sha256 = "0320586856674d16b0b7a4d4afb22151bdc798490bb7f295eddd8f6a62b46fea",
+    strip_prefix = "abseil-cpp-fb3621f4f897824c0dbe0615fa94543df6192f30",
+    url = "https://github.com/abseil/abseil-cpp/archive/fb3621f4f897824c0dbe0615fa94543df6192f30.tar.gz",
+)
diff --git a/checkpoint/orbax/checkpoint/_src/path/snapshot/BUILD b/checkpoint/orbax/checkpoint/_src/path/snapshot/BUILD
index adf5211c..8169b7cf 100644
--- a/checkpoint/orbax/checkpoint/_src/path/snapshot/BUILD
+++ b/checkpoint/orbax/checkpoint/_src/path/snapshot/BUILD
@@ -16,6 +16,6 @@ py_test(
     srcs_version = "PY3",
     deps = [
         ":snapshot",
-        "//absl/testing:absltest",
+        "@com_google_absl//absl/testing:absltest",
     ],
 )
diff --git a/requirements.txt b/requirements.txt
index d55c25ac..a62782af 100644
--- a/requirements.txt
+++ b/requirements.txt
@@ -13,4 +13,5 @@
 jax>=0.4.34
 jaxlib>=0.4.34
 portpicker~=1.6
+absl-py>=1.0,==1.*