diff --git a/drivers/hwmon/coretemp.c b/drivers/hwmon/coretemp.c
index 8bf32c6c85d95a..30a19d711f8985 100644
--- a/drivers/hwmon/coretemp.c
+++ b/drivers/hwmon/coretemp.c
@@ -533,6 +533,10 @@ static void coretemp_remove_core(struct platform_data *pdata, int indx)
 {
 	struct temp_data *tdata = pdata->core_data[indx];
 
+	/* if we errored on add then this is already gone */
+	if (!tdata)
+		return;
+
 	/* Remove the sysfs attributes */
 	sysfs_remove_group(&pdata->hwmon_dev->kobj, &tdata->attr_group);