diff --git a/START.bat b/START.bat
index a156868..417f070 100644
--- a/START.bat
+++ b/START.bat
@@ -163,6 +163,8 @@ echo Checking if requirements are satisfied...
 :: Try importing key packages to see if they're installed
 python -c "import PyQt5; import openai; import dotenv; import PIL; print('All dependencies satisfied')" >nul 2>&1
 if errorlevel 1 (
+    echo Upgrading pip...
+    python -m pip install --upgrade pip >nul 2>&1
     echo Installing/updating requirements...
     pip install -r requirements.txt
     if errorlevel 1 (
diff --git a/requirements.txt b/requirements.txt
index 08e8834..e2350dc 100644
--- a/requirements.txt
+++ b/requirements.txt
@@ -5,5 +5,5 @@ retry==0.9.2
 ruamel.yaml==0.17.32
 tiktoken==0.8.0
 tqdm==4.65.0
-pillow==11.0.0
+pillow>=12.1.0
 PyQt5>=5.15.0