diff --git a/misc/ipbt/Makefile b/misc/ipbt/Makefile
index 15288c63175f..1d093dab35f0 100644
--- a/misc/ipbt/Makefile
+++ b/misc/ipbt/Makefile
@@ -13,7 +13,7 @@ COMMENT=	High-tech ttyrec player with improvements over ttyplay
 USES=		ncurses perl5 shebangfix
 
 ALL_TARGET=	${PORTNAME}
-MAKE_ARGS=	LFLAGS="${LDFLAGS}"
+MAKE_ARGS=	LFLAGS="${LDFLAGS}" NCURSES_LIB=-l${NCURSES_IMPL}
 PLIST_FILES=	bin/ipbt bin/ttygrep bin/ttydump man/man1/ipbt.1.gz
 SHEBANG_FILES=	sbcsgen.pl Makefile ttygrep ttydump
 
diff --git a/misc/ipbt/files/patch-Makefile b/misc/ipbt/files/patch-Makefile
new file mode 100644
index 000000000000..8e7f9b3fa528
--- /dev/null
+++ b/misc/ipbt/files/patch-Makefile
@@ -0,0 +1,17 @@
+--- Makefile.orig	2020-01-02 09:04:45 UTC
++++ Makefile
+@@ -1,3 +1,5 @@
++NCURSES_LIB=	-lncursesw
++
+ .c.o:
+ 	$(CC) $(CFLAGS) $(XFLAGS) -c $*.c
+ 
+@@ -7,7 +9,7 @@ IPBT = be_none.o fromucs.o ipbt.o ldiscucs.o localenc.
+        wcwidth.o xenc.o
+ 
+ ipbt: $(IPBT)
+-	$(CC) $(LFLAGS) -o ipbt $(IPBT) -lm -lncursesw
++	$(CC) $(LFLAGS) -o ipbt $(IPBT) -lm $(NCURSES_LIB)
+ 
+ be_none.o: be_none.c putty.h puttyps.h unix.h charset.h network.h misc.h \
+   puttymem.h