diff --git a/README.md b/README.md
index 87dd546..ffa10cc 100644
--- a/README.md
+++ b/README.md
@@ -66,7 +66,7 @@ Please download these datasets from [Dryad](https://datadryad.org/stash/dataset/
         ```
     - Turn off autorestarting for the redis server in terminal:
         - `sudo systemctl disable redis-server`
-- `CMake >= 3.14` and `gcc >= 10.1` are required for the ngram language model installation. You can install these on linux with `sudo apt-get install build-essential`.
+- `CMake >= 3.14` and `gcc >= 10.1` are required for the ngram language model installation. You can install these on linux with `sudo apt-get install cmake` and `sudo apt-get install build-essential`.
 
 ## Python environment setup for model training and evaluation
 To create a conda environment with the necessary dependencies, run the following command from the root directory of this repository:
diff --git a/language_model/README.md b/language_model/README.md
index e5efc90..47ca2e9 100644
--- a/language_model/README.md
+++ b/language_model/README.md
@@ -10,6 +10,7 @@ pytorch == 1.13.1
 To install CMake and gcc on Ubuntu, simply run:
 ```bash
 sudo apt-get install build-essential
+sudo apt-get install cmake
 ```
 
 # Install language model python package
diff --git a/setup_lm.sh b/setup_lm.sh
index 17f109c..0e2d6b2 100755
--- a/setup_lm.sh
+++ b/setup_lm.sh
@@ -18,6 +18,18 @@ if [ -d "language_model/runtime/server/x86/fc_base" ]; then
     exit 1
 fi
 
+# make sure CMake is installed
+if ! command -v cmake &> /dev/null; then
+    echo "CMake is not installed. Please install CMake >= 3.14 before running this script with 'sudo apt-get install cmake'."
+    exit 1
+fi
+
+# make sure gcc is installed
+if ! command -v gcc &> /dev/null; then
+    echo "GCC is not installed. Please install GCC >= 10.1 before running this script with 'sudo apt-get install build-essential'."
+    exit 1
+fi
+
 # Ensure conda is available
 source "$(conda info --base)/etc/profile.d/conda.sh"