diff --git a/README.md b/README.md
index b3a501775..af0d32b81 100644
--- a/README.md
+++ b/README.md
@@ -3,3 +3,21 @@
 Memgraph is an ACID compliant high performance transactional distributed
 in-memory graph database featuring runtime native query compiling, lock free
 data structures, multi-version concurrency control and asynchronous IO.
+
+## dependencies
+
+Memgraph can be compiled using any modern c++ compiler. It mostly relies on
+the standard template library, however, some things do require external
+libraries.
+
+Some code contains linux-specific libraries and the build is only supported
+on a 64 bit linux kernel.
+
+* linux
+* clang 3.5 or Gcc 4.8 (good c++11 support, especially lock free atomics)
+* boost 1.55 (or something, probably works with almost anything)
+* lexertl (2015-07-14)
+* catch (for compiling tests)
+
+## build
+