diff --git a/src/as-utils-private.h b/src/as-utils-private.h
index 319c6638..424a79f1 100644
--- a/src/as-utils-private.h
+++ b/src/as-utils-private.h
@@ -120,7 +120,7 @@ void as_ref_string_assign_transfer (GRefString **rstr_ptr, GRefString *new_rstr)
 AS_INTERNAL_VISIBLE
 gboolean as_utils_extract_tarball (const gchar *filename, const gchar *target_dir, GError **error);
 
-gboolean as_utils_is_ignored_category_name (const gchar *category_name);
+gboolean as_utils_category_name_is_bad (const gchar *category_name);
 
 gboolean as_utils_is_platform_triplet_arch (const gchar *arch);
 gboolean as_utils_is_platform_triplet_oskernel (const gchar *os);
diff --git a/src/as-utils.c b/src/as-utils.c
index 913a0bae..99ae2e93 100644
--- a/src/as-utils.c
+++ b/src/as-utils.c
@@ -1358,9 +1358,9 @@ as_utils_category_name_is_bad (const gchar *category_name)
 		return TRUE;
 
 	/* we want to ignore custom categories */
-	if (g_str_has_prefix (cat, "X-"))
+	if (g_str_has_prefix (category_name, "X-"))
 		return TRUE;
-	if (g_str_has_prefix (cat, "x-"))
+	if (g_str_has_prefix (category_name, "x-"))
 		return TRUE;
 
 	return FALSE;
diff --git a/src/as-validator-issue-tag.h b/src/as-validator-issue-tag.h
index ff384639..5714dd9c 100644
--- a/src/as-validator-issue-tag.h
+++ b/src/as-validator-issue-tag.h
@@ -743,6 +743,12 @@ AsValidatorIssueTag as_validator_issue_tag_list[] =  {
 	  N_("The category name is not valid. Refer to the XDG Menu Specification for a list of valid category names."),
 	},
 
+	{ "all-categories-ignored",
+	  AS_ISSUE_SEVERITY_WARNING,
+	  N_("All categories for this component have been ignored, either because they were invalid or because they are of low quality "
+	     "(e.g. custom 'X-' prefixed or toolkit ones like 'GTK' or 'Qt'). Please fix your category names, or add more categories."),
+	},
+
 	{ "app-categories-missing",
 	  AS_ISSUE_SEVERITY_ERROR,
 	  N_("This component is in no valid categories, even though it should be. Please check its metainfo file and desktop-entry file."),
diff --git a/src/as-validator.c b/src/as-validator.c
index f09d191e..3424a6e4 100644
--- a/src/as-validator.c
+++ b/src/as-validator.c
@@ -3398,11 +3398,11 @@ as_validator_validate_component_node (AsValidator *validator, AsContext *ctx, xm
 
 	/* validate categories */
 	if (as_component_get_categories (cpt)->len > 0) {
-		guint j;
 		GPtrArray *cat_array;
+		gboolean have_valid_category = FALSE;
 
 		cat_array = as_component_get_categories (cpt);
-		for (j = 0; j < cat_array->len; j++) {
+		for (guint j = 0; j < cat_array->len; j++) {
 			const gchar *category_name = (const gchar *) g_ptr_array_index (cat_array,
 											j);
 
@@ -3411,7 +3411,19 @@ as_validator_validate_component_node (AsValidator *validator, AsContext *ctx, xm
 							NULL,
 							"category-invalid",
 							category_name);
+				continue;
 			}
+
+			/* check if the category would be ignored during catalog composition */
+			if (as_utils_category_name_is_bad (category_name))
+				continue;
+
+			have_valid_category = TRUE;
+		}
+
+		if (!have_valid_category) {
+			/* the user clearly intended there to be categories, yet we ended up with no valid ones */
+			as_validator_add_issue (validator, NULL, "all-categories-ignored", NULL);
 		}
 	}