diff --git a/.azure-pipelines.yml b/.azure-pipelines.yml
index eb390123980..8b621f185e2 100644
--- a/.azure-pipelines.yml
+++ b/.azure-pipelines.yml
@@ -13,6 +13,7 @@ jobs:
     BLASPP_HOME: '/usr/local'
     CEI_SUDO: 'sudo'
     CEI_TMP: '/tmp/cei'
+    CMAKE_GENERATOR: 'Ninja'
     FFTW_HOME: '/usr'
     LAPACKPP_HOME: '/usr/local'
     OMP_NUM_THREADS: 1
@@ -75,7 +76,8 @@ jobs:
       set -eu -o pipefail
       cat /proc/cpuinfo | grep "model name" | sort -u
       df -h
-      sudo apt install -y ccache curl gcc gfortran git g++ openmpi-bin libopenmpi-dev \
+      sudo apt install -y ccache curl gcc gfortran git g++ ninja-build \
+        openmpi-bin libopenmpi-dev \
         libfftw3-dev libfftw3-mpi-dev libhdf5-openmpi-dev pkg-config make \
         python3 python3-pip python3-venv python3-setuptools libblas-dev liblapack-dev
       ccache --set-config=max_size=10.0G