diff --git a/var/spack/repos/builtin/packages/axom/package.py b/var/spack/repos/builtin/packages/axom/package.py
index add0619a3e8878950712bbbd537b12dd6d1d510c..a4e954711a26acbf97f722c69542b500a1fb9fb1 100644
--- a/var/spack/repos/builtin/packages/axom/package.py
+++ b/var/spack/repos/builtin/packages/axom/package.py
@@ -124,7 +124,7 @@ class Axom(CMakePackage, CudaPackage):
         depends_on('umpire cuda_arch={0}'.format(sm_),
                    when='+umpire cuda_arch={0}'.format(sm_))
 
-    depends_on("mfem~mpi~hypre~metis~zlib", when="+mfem")
+    depends_on("mfem~mpi~metis~zlib", when="+mfem")
 
     depends_on("python", when="+python")
 
diff --git a/var/spack/repos/builtin/packages/cardioid/package.py b/var/spack/repos/builtin/packages/cardioid/package.py
index c95035b5bf189c9756ec0164715ec55288f008df..6395620d6ed56f6363c2244188c58d60686714fb 100644
--- a/var/spack/repos/builtin/packages/cardioid/package.py
+++ b/var/spack/repos/builtin/packages/cardioid/package.py
@@ -25,8 +25,8 @@ class Cardioid(CMakePackage):
     depends_on('lapack')
     depends_on('mpi')
     depends_on('cuda', when="+cuda")
-    depends_on('mfem+hypre+superlu-dist+lapack', when="+mfem~cuda")
-    depends_on('mfem+hypre+superlu-dist+lapack^hypre+cuda', when="+mfem+cuda")
+    depends_on('mfem+mpi+superlu-dist+lapack', when="+mfem~cuda")
+    depends_on('mfem+mpi+superlu-dist+lapack^hypre+cuda', when="+mfem+cuda")
     depends_on('cmake@3.1:', type='build')
     depends_on('perl', type='build')
 
diff --git a/var/spack/repos/builtin/packages/mfem/package.py b/var/spack/repos/builtin/packages/mfem/package.py
index 3a4abab49bf42a1324e9aeaa651dc2bf31ca3dfb..1a90ef31b9012d381118888c5671d11c92c9269c 100644
--- a/var/spack/repos/builtin/packages/mfem/package.py
+++ b/var/spack/repos/builtin/packages/mfem/package.py
@@ -92,12 +92,6 @@ class Mfem(Package):
     # Can we make the default value for 'metis' to depend on the 'mpi' value?
     variant('metis', default=True,
             description='Enable METIS support')
-    # TODO: The 'hypre' variant is the same as 'mpi', we may want to remove it.
-    #       For now, keep the 'hypre' variant while ignoring its setting. This
-    #       is done to preserve compatibility with other packages that refer to
-    #       it, e.g. xSDK.
-    variant('hypre', default=True,
-            description='Required for MPI parallelism')
     variant('openmp', default=False,
             description='Enable OpenMP parallelism')
     variant('cuda', default=False, description='Enable CUDA support')