diff --git a/packages/plugin-react/src/index.ts b/packages/plugin-react/src/index.ts
index f1adf81510bcef..5a82b0a2a6cd0e 100644
--- a/packages/plugin-react/src/index.ts
+++ b/packages/plugin-react/src/index.ts
@@ -406,7 +406,10 @@ export default function viteReact(opts: Options = {}): PluginOption[] {
     config() {
       return {
         optimizeDeps: {
-          include: [reactJsxRuntimeId, reactJsxDevRuntimeId]
+          // We can't add `react-dom` because the dependency is `react-dom/client`
+          // for React 18 while it's `react-dom` for React 17. We'd need to detect
+          // what React version the user has installed.
+          include: [reactJsxRuntimeId, reactJsxDevRuntimeId, 'react']
         }
       }
     },