diff --git a/Makefile.base b/Makefile.base
index b4b1a495cc..0132e8c7e7 100644
--- a/Makefile.base
+++ b/Makefile.base
@@ -45,7 +45,11 @@ ifeq (1, $(SUBMODULES))
   BASE_MODULE ?= $(MODULE)
 
   # for each $(BASE_MODULE)_<name> in USEMODULE, add <name>.c to SRC
-  SRC += $(wildcard $(patsubst $(BASE_MODULE)_%,%.c,$(filter $(BASE_MODULE)_%,$(USEMODULE))))
+  # unless in SUBMODULES_NO_SRC
+  SRC += $(wildcard \
+            $(filter-out $(SUBMODULES_NO_SRC),\
+                $(patsubst $(BASE_MODULE)_%,%.c,\
+                    $(filter $(BASE_MODULE)_%,$(USEMODULE)))))
 
   # remove duplicates
   SRC := $(sort $(SRC))
diff --git a/doc/doxygen/src/creating-modules.md b/doc/doxygen/src/creating-modules.md
index d217f791e3..0182efc8a8 100644
--- a/doc/doxygen/src/creating-modules.md
+++ b/doc/doxygen/src/creating-modules.md
@@ -160,7 +160,8 @@ the only parts of compounded module names and only match against part of that na
 
 See `sys/ztimer/Makefile` for an example in code.
 
-`SUBMODULES` can also be true-pseudomodules.
+`SUBMODULES` can also be true-pseudomodules, or become one by conditionally excluding
+the source files by adding them to `SUBMODULES_NO_SRC`.
 
 # Helper tools