diff --git a/.github/workflows/test.yaml b/.github/workflows/test.yaml
index 417633fe..92d4a8a5 100644
--- a/.github/workflows/test.yaml
+++ b/.github/workflows/test.yaml
@@ -37,7 +37,7 @@ jobs:
       - name: Install dependencies
         run: |
           pip install poetry~=1.3.0
-          poetry install --no-interaction --only main,test
+          poetry install --no-interaction --only main,test --all-extras
       - name: Run tests with pytest
         run: |
           poetry run pytest --cov=reuse
@@ -53,7 +53,6 @@ jobs:
       - name: Install dependencies
         run: |
           pip install poetry~=1.3.0
-          pip install shtab
           poetry install --no-interaction --only main,dev,test
       - name: Lint with Pylint
         run: |
@@ -87,7 +86,6 @@ jobs:
       - name: Install dependencies
         run: |
           pip install poetry~=1.3.0
-          pip install shtab
           poetry install --no-interaction --only main,dev,test
       - name: Test typing with mypy
         run: |
diff --git a/README.md b/README.md
index 66107ce9..eec79cac 100644
--- a/README.md
+++ b/README.md
@@ -267,6 +267,16 @@ repos:
       - id: reuse-lint-file
 ```
 
+### Shell completion
+
+You can generate a shell completion script with `reuse --print-completion bash`.
+Replace 'bash' as needed. You must place the printed text in a file dictated by
+your shell to benefit from completions.
+
+This functionality depends on `shtab`, which is an optional dependency. To
+benefit from this feature, install reuse with the `completion` extra, like
+`pipx install reuse[completion]`.
+
 ## Maintainers
 
 - Carmen Bianca Bakker <carmenbianca@fsfe.org>
diff --git a/changelog.d/added/shtab.md b/changelog.d/added/shtab.md
new file mode 100644
index 00000000..b3543469
--- /dev/null
+++ b/changelog.d/added/shtab.md
@@ -0,0 +1 @@
+- Added `--print-completion` using a new `shtab` optional dependency. (#1076)
diff --git a/docs/man/reuse.rst b/docs/man/reuse.rst
index 37bbe644..121b6614 100644
--- a/docs/man/reuse.rst
+++ b/docs/man/reuse.rst
@@ -80,9 +80,14 @@ Options
 
 .. option:: -s, --print-completion SHELL
 
-  Print a static shell completion file, for the given shell. This option depends
-  on python-shtab and as such defines which shells are supported. Presently this
-  includes bash, tcsh and zsh, with fish support being proposed.
+  Print a static shell completion script for the given shell and exit. You must
+  place the printed text in a file dictated by your shell before the completions
+  will function. For Bash, this file is
+  ``${XDG_DATA_HOME}/bash-completion/reuse``.
+
+  This option depends on ``shtab``, which is an optional dependency of
+  :program:`reuse`. The supported shells depend on your installed version of
+  ``shtab``.
 
 .. option:: -h, --help
 
diff --git a/poetry.lock b/poetry.lock
index 728d880a..39dc3d47 100644
--- a/poetry.lock
+++ b/poetry.lock
@@ -1350,6 +1350,7 @@ files = [
     {file = "PyYAML-6.0.1-cp311-cp311-win_amd64.whl", hash = "sha256:bf07ee2fef7014951eeb99f56f39c9bb4af143d8aa3c21b1677805985307da34"},
     {file = "PyYAML-6.0.1-cp312-cp312-macosx_10_9_x86_64.whl", hash = "sha256:855fb52b0dc35af121542a76b9a84f8d1cd886ea97c84703eaa6d88e37a2ad28"},
     {file = "PyYAML-6.0.1-cp312-cp312-macosx_11_0_arm64.whl", hash = "sha256:40df9b996c2b73138957fe23a16a4f0ba614f4c0efce1e9406a184b6d07fa3a9"},
+    {file = "PyYAML-6.0.1-cp312-cp312-manylinux_2_17_aarch64.manylinux2014_aarch64.whl", hash = "sha256:a08c6f0fe150303c1c6b71ebcd7213c2858041a7e01975da3a99aed1e7a378ef"},
     {file = "PyYAML-6.0.1-cp312-cp312-manylinux_2_17_x86_64.manylinux2014_x86_64.whl", hash = "sha256:6c22bec3fbe2524cde73d7ada88f6566758a8f7227bfbf93a408a9d86bcc12a0"},
     {file = "PyYAML-6.0.1-cp312-cp312-musllinux_1_1_x86_64.whl", hash = "sha256:8d4e9c88387b0f5c7d5f281e55304de64cf7f9c0021a3525bd3b1c542da3b0e4"},
     {file = "PyYAML-6.0.1-cp312-cp312-win32.whl", hash = "sha256:d483d2cdf104e7c9fa60c544d92981f12ad66a457afae824d146093b8c294c54"},
@@ -1406,6 +1407,21 @@ urllib3 = ">=1.21.1,<3"
 socks = ["PySocks (>=1.5.6,!=1.5.7)"]
 use-chardet-on-py3 = ["chardet (>=3.0.2,<6)"]
 
+[[package]]
+name = "shtab"
+version = "1.7.1"
+description = "Automagic shell tab completion for Python CLI applications"
+category = "main"
+optional = true
+python-versions = ">=3.7"
+files = [
+    {file = "shtab-1.7.1-py3-none-any.whl", hash = "sha256:32d3d2ff9022d4c77a62492b6ec875527883891e33c6b479ba4d41a51e259983"},
+    {file = "shtab-1.7.1.tar.gz", hash = "sha256:4e4bcb02eeb82ec45920a5d0add92eac9c9b63b2804c9196c1f1fdc2d039243c"},
+]
+
+[package.extras]
+dev = ["pytest (>=6)", "pytest-cov", "pytest-timeout"]
+
 [[package]]
 name = "six"
 version = "1.16.0"
@@ -1810,7 +1826,10 @@ files = [
 doc = ["furo", "jaraco.packaging (>=9.3)", "jaraco.tidelift (>=1.4)", "rst.linker (>=1.9)", "sphinx (>=3.5)", "sphinx-lint"]
 test = ["big-O", "importlib-resources", "jaraco.functools", "jaraco.itertools", "jaraco.test", "more-itertools", "pytest (>=6,!=8.1.*)", "pytest-checkdocs (>=2.4)", "pytest-cov", "pytest-enabler (>=2.2)", "pytest-ignore-flaky", "pytest-mypy", "pytest-ruff (>=0.2.1)"]
 
+[extras]
+completion = ["shtab"]
+
 [metadata]
 lock-version = "2.0"
 python-versions = "^3.8"
-content-hash = "3f000ef7f191dd1e5648641ddfef4e469429e33e583299bbcac630bfd59ac10b"
+content-hash = "d8a6ce43f7e484927e2f0de8eeea38d3058f7802c96670e8552fb3e0434b655b"
diff --git a/pyproject.toml b/pyproject.toml
index 1f8e51d8..3f60bac6 100644
--- a/pyproject.toml
+++ b/pyproject.toml
@@ -60,6 +60,10 @@ license-expression = ">=1.0"
 python-debian = ">=0.1.34,!=0.1.45,!=0.1.46,!=0.1.47"
 tomlkit = ">=0.8"
 attrs = ">=21.3"
+shtab = { version = ">=1.4.0", optional = true }
+
+[tool.poetry.extras]
+completion = ["shtab"]
 
 [tool.poetry.group.test.dependencies]
 pytest = ">=6.0.0"
diff --git a/src/reuse/_main.py b/src/reuse/_main.py
index 0b6a6b0b..aab68774 100644
--- a/src/reuse/_main.py
+++ b/src/reuse/_main.py
@@ -10,12 +10,14 @@
 """Entry functions for reuse."""
 
 import argparse
+import contextlib
 import logging
 import os
 import sys
 import warnings
 from gettext import gettext as _
 from pathlib import Path
+from types import ModuleType
 from typing import IO, Callable, List, Optional, Type, cast
 
 from . import (
@@ -35,10 +37,9 @@
 from .project import GlobalLicensingConflict, GlobalLicensingFound, Project
 from .vcs import find_root
 
-try:
-    import shtab
-except ImportError:
-    shtab = None
+shtab: Optional[ModuleType] = None
+with contextlib.suppress(ImportError):
+    import shtab  # type: ignore[no-redef]
 
 _LOGGER = logging.getLogger(__name__)
 
@@ -110,6 +111,7 @@ def parser() -> argparse.ArgumentParser:
         help=_("define root of project"),
     )
     if shtab:
+        # This is magic. Running `reuse -s bash` now prints bash completions.
         shtab.add_argument_to(parser, ["-s", "--print-completion"])
     parser.add_argument(
         "--version",
diff --git a/tests/test_main.py b/tests/test_main.py
index 94c078f9..fb64530b 100644
--- a/tests/test_main.py
+++ b/tests/test_main.py
@@ -29,7 +29,7 @@
 from freezegun import freeze_time
 
 from reuse import download
-from reuse._main import main
+from reuse._main import main, shtab
 from reuse._util import GIT_EXE, HG_EXE, JUJUTSU_EXE, PIJUL_EXE, cleandoc_nl
 from reuse.report import LINT_VERSION
 
@@ -88,6 +88,16 @@ def mock_put_license_in_file(monkeypatch):
     return result
 
 
+@pytest.mark.skipif(not shtab, reason="shtab required")
+def test_print_completion(capsys):
+    """shtab completions are printed."""
+    with pytest.raises(SystemExit) as error:
+        main(["--print-completion", "bash"])
+
+    assert error.value.code == 0
+    assert "AUTOMATICALLY GENERATED by `shtab`" in capsys.readouterr().out
+
+
 def test_lint(fake_repository, stringio, optional_git_exe, optional_hg_exe):
     """Run a successful lint. The optional VCSs are there to make sure that the
     test also works if these programs are not installed.