diff --git a/lib/internal/modules/esm/module_job.js b/lib/internal/modules/esm/module_job.js
index ebae1940502b4b..ea10166fdd3536 100644
--- a/lib/internal/modules/esm/module_job.js
+++ b/lib/internal/modules/esm/module_job.js
@@ -151,7 +151,17 @@ class ModuleJob {
     await this.instantiate();
     const timeout = -1;
     const breakOnSigint = false;
-    await this.module.evaluate(timeout, breakOnSigint);
+    try {
+      await this.module.evaluate(timeout, breakOnSigint);
+    } catch (e) {
+      if (e.name === 'ReferenceError' &&
+          e.message === 'require is not defined') {
+        e.message += ' in ES module scope. You can use `await import` instead' +
+                     ', or use `.cjs` extension to load the file as CommonJS ' +
+                     'module.';
+      }
+      throw e;
+    }
     return { module: this.module };
   }
 }
diff --git a/test/es-module/test-esm-undefined-require.js b/test/es-module/test-esm-undefined-require.js
new file mode 100644
index 00000000000000..bf5c1d07d71d75
--- /dev/null
+++ b/test/es-module/test-esm-undefined-require.js
@@ -0,0 +1,9 @@
+'use strict';
+const common = require('../common');
+const assert = require('assert');
+
+assert.rejects(
+  import('data:text/javascript,require;'),
+  // eslint-disable-next-line node-core/no-unescaped-regexp-dot
+  /use .await import. instead/
+).then(common.mustCall());