diff --git a/INSTALL.md b/INSTALL.md
index 7e7ad229b4..3ad0cb4c62 100644
--- a/INSTALL.md
+++ b/INSTALL.md
@@ -61,7 +61,8 @@ NEW or CHANGED MINIMUM dependencies since the last major release are **bold**.
      * giflib >= 4.1 (tested through 5.2; 5.0+ is strongly recommended for
        stability and thread safety)
  * If you want support for HEIF/HEIC or AVIF images:
-     * libheif >= 1.3 (1.7 required for AVIF support, tested through 1.17.6)
+     * libheif >= 1.3 (1.7 required for AVIF support, 1.16 required for
+       correct orientation support, tested through 1.17.6)
      * libheif must be built with an AV1 encoder/decoder for AVIF support.
      * Avoid libheif 1.10 on Mac, it is very broken. Libheif 1.11+ is fine.
  * If you want support for DICOM medical image files:
diff --git a/src/cmake/externalpackages.cmake b/src/cmake/externalpackages.cmake
index 4068330fb2..6b21270b32 100644
--- a/src/cmake/externalpackages.cmake
+++ b/src/cmake/externalpackages.cmake
@@ -212,8 +212,8 @@ checked_find_package (GIF
 
 # For HEIF/HEIC/AVIF formats
 checked_find_package (Libheif VERSION_MIN 1.3
-                      RECOMMEND_MIN 1.7
-                      RECOMMEND_MIN_REASON "for AVIF support")
+                      RECOMMEND_MIN 1.16
+                      RECOMMEND_MIN_REASON "for orientation support")
 if (APPLE AND LIBHEIF_VERSION VERSION_GREATER_EQUAL 1.10 AND LIBHEIF_VERSION VERSION_LESS 1.11)
     message (WARNING "Libheif 1.10 on Apple is known to be broken, disabling libheif support")
     set (Libheif_FOUND 0)
diff --git a/src/heif.imageio/heifinput.cpp b/src/heif.imageio/heifinput.cpp
index cba7b20d16..436b9a5110 100644
--- a/src/heif.imageio/heifinput.cpp
+++ b/src/heif.imageio/heifinput.cpp
@@ -309,6 +309,7 @@ HeifInput::seek_subimage(int subimage, int miplevel)
         }
     }
 
+#if LIBHEIF_NUMERIC_VERSION >= MAKE_LIBHEIF_VERSION(1, 16, 0, 0)
     // Try to discover the orientation. The Exif is unreliable. We have to go
     // through the transformation properties ourselves. A tricky bit is that
     // the C++ API doesn't give us a direct way to get the context ptr, we
@@ -321,7 +322,6 @@ HeifInput::seek_subimage(int subimage, int miplevel)
         = reinterpret_cast<std::shared_ptr<heif_context>*>(m_ctx.get())->get();
     int xpcount = heif_item_get_transformation_properties(raw_ctx, id, nullptr,
                                                           100);
-    orientation = 1;
     xpcount     = std::min(xpcount, 100);  // clamp to some reasonable limit
     std::vector<heif_property_id> xprops(xpcount);
     heif_item_get_transformation_properties(raw_ctx, id, xprops.data(),
@@ -348,6 +348,11 @@ HeifInput::seek_subimage(int subimage, int miplevel)
             }
         }
     }
+#else
+    // Prior to libheif 1.16, the get_transformation_properties API was not
+    // available, so we have to rely on the Exif orientation tag.
+    int orientation = m_spec.get_int_attribute("Orientation", 1);
+#endif
 
     // Erase the orientation metadata because libheif appears to be doing
     // the rotation-to-canonical-direction for us.