diff --git a/.gitlab-ci/crosvm-init.sh b/.gitlab-ci/crosvm-init.sh
index 490960b3104..57366bf9751 100755
--- a/.gitlab-ci/crosvm-init.sh
+++ b/.gitlab-ci/crosvm-init.sh
@@ -14,6 +14,9 @@ mount -t tmpfs tmpfs /tmp
 
 . ${VM_TEMP_DIR}/crosvm-env.sh
 
+# Required by the wayland platform
+export XDG_RUNTIME_DIR=$(mktemp -d)
+
 # .gitlab-ci.yml script variable is using relative paths to install directory,
 # so change to that dir before running `crosvm-script`
 cd "${CI_PROJECT_DIR}"