diff --git a/scripts/changelog.awk b/scripts/changelog.awk
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..e1644e6
--- /dev/null
+++ b/scripts/changelog.awk
@@ -0,0 +1,4 @@
+BEGIN { cl = 0; api = 0; }
+/^CHANGELOG.md$/ { cl=1 }
+/^include[/]libpldm/ { api=1 }
+END { exit !(cl || !api); }
diff --git a/scripts/pre-submit b/scripts/pre-submit
index 0c00ac5..8d50341 100755
--- a/scripts/pre-submit
+++ b/scripts/pre-submit
@@ -7,6 +7,15 @@
 meson format --recursive --inplace || true
 git diff --quiet
 
+# Make sure if the change touches the public headers, it also updates the
+# changelog.
+if ! git show --format="" --name-only HEAD -- CHANGELOG.md include/libpldm |
+  awk -f scripts/changelog.awk
+then
+  echo You must document your changes under include/libpldm in CHANGELOG.md
+  exit 1
+fi
+
 # Ensure the test suite passes in the default configuration. Note
 # that we don't specify -Dabi=... - the default is equivalent to
 # -Dabi=deprecated,stable,testing.