diff --git a/cmake/compilerFlags.cmake b/cmake/compilerFlags.cmake
index ed0e1e33..d8776411 100644
--- a/cmake/compilerFlags.cmake
+++ b/cmake/compilerFlags.cmake
@@ -139,7 +139,7 @@ if(MSVC)
 
     # Object Level Parallelism
     add_compile_options(/MP)
-    add_definitions(-DNOMINMAX -DWIN32_LEAN_AND_MEAN)
+    add_definitions(-DNOMINMAX)	# This definition is not only needed for Exiv2 but also for xmpsdk
     
     # https://devblogs.microsoft.com/cppblog/msvc-now-correctly-reports-__cplusplus/
     if (MSVC_VERSION GREATER_EQUAL "1910") # VS2017 and up
diff --git a/src/CMakeLists.txt b/src/CMakeLists.txt
index 83cbbb00..38cb8f41 100644
--- a/src/CMakeLists.txt
+++ b/src/CMakeLists.txt
@@ -192,7 +192,9 @@ if (EXIV2_ENABLE_WEBREADY)
 endif()
 
 if (WIN32)
-    target_compile_definitions(exiv2lib PRIVATE PSAPI_VERSION=1) # to be compatible with <= WinVista (#905)
+    target_compile_definitions(exiv2lib PRIVATE PSAPI_VERSION=1)    # to be compatible with <= WinVista (#905)
+    # Since windows.h is included in some headers, we need to propagate this definition
+    target_compile_definitions(exiv2lib PUBLIC WIN32_LEAN_AND_MEAN) 
 endif()
 
 if (NOT MSVC)