diff --git a/unittest/force-styles/test_pair_style.cpp b/unittest/force-styles/test_pair_style.cpp
index a2c8424024..898fb8e412 100644
--- a/unittest/force-styles/test_pair_style.cpp
+++ b/unittest/force-styles/test_pair_style.cpp
@@ -858,6 +858,13 @@ TEST(PairStyle, gpu)
     if (!Info::has_gpu_device()) GTEST_SKIP();
     if (test_config.skip_tests.count(test_info_->name())) GTEST_SKIP();
 
+    // when testing PPPM styles with GPUs and GPU support is compiled with single precision
+    // we also must have single precision FFTs; otherwise skip since the test would abort
+    if (utils::strmatch(test_config.basename, ".*pppm.*") &&
+        (Info::has_accelerator_feature("GPU", "precision", "single")) &&
+        (!Info::has_fft_single_support()))
+        GTEST_SKIP();
+
     const char *args_neigh[]   = {"PairStyle", "-log",    "none", "-echo",
                                 "screen",    "-nocite", "-sf",  "gpu"};
     const char *args_noneigh[] = {"PairStyle", "-log", "none", "-echo", "screen", "-nocite", "-sf",