diff --git a/setup.cfg b/setup.cfg
index 45580a9..9f2b4c9 100644
--- a/setup.cfg
+++ b/setup.cfg
@@ -28,7 +28,7 @@ install_requires =
     colcon-core>=0.5.6
 packages = find:
 tests_require =
-    flake8
+    flake8>=3.6.0
     flake8-blind-except
     flake8-builtins
     flake8-class-newline
@@ -38,10 +38,10 @@ tests_require =
     flake8-import-order
     flake8-quotes
     pep8-naming
-    pyenchant
     pylint
     pytest
     pytest-cov
+    scspell3k>=2.2
 zip_safe = true
 
 [options.package_data]
@@ -51,6 +51,11 @@ colcon_lcov_result.verb.configuration = lcovrc
 colcon_core.verb =
     lcov-result = colcon_lcov_result.verb.lcov_result:LcovResultVerb
 
+[tool:pytest]
+markers =
+    flake8
+    linter
+
 [flake8]
 import-order-style = google
 max-line-length = 99
diff --git a/test/spell_check.words b/test/spell_check.words
index ffc2d82..f9bcbee 100644
--- a/test/spell_check.words
+++ b/test/spell_check.words
@@ -1,17 +1,29 @@
-CMake
+ament
+apache
+cmake
 colcon
-filt
+demangle
 gcno
 gcov
 genhtml
-html
+iterdir
 lcov
 lcovrc
+linter
+nargs
+nofilt
 noqa
-pragma
+pathlib
+pkgs
+plugin
+pydocstyle
+pytest
+returncode
 rtype
-stderr
-stdout
-str
+scspell
+setuptools
+staticmethod
+thomas
 tracefile
 tracefiles
+zerocounters
diff --git a/test/test_copyright_license.py b/test/test_copyright_license.py
index 01d0c85..dffe460 100644
--- a/test/test_copyright_license.py
+++ b/test/test_copyright_license.py
@@ -4,8 +4,11 @@
 from pathlib import Path
 import sys
 
+import pytest
 
-def test_copyright_licence():
+
+@pytest.mark.linter
+def test_copyright_license():
     missing = check_files([Path(__file__).parents[1]])
     assert not len(missing), \
         'In some files no copyright / license line was found'
@@ -25,8 +28,8 @@ def check_files(paths):
             if not content:
                 continue
             lines = content.splitlines()
-            has_copyright = \
-                any(line for line in lines if line.startswith('# Copyright'))
+            has_copyright = any(filter(
+                lambda line: line.startswith('# Copyright'), lines))
             has_license = \
                 '# Licensed under the Apache License, Version 2.0' in lines
             if not has_copyright or not has_license:
diff --git a/test/test_flake8.py b/test/test_flake8.py
index 48eece0..5ff3e4d 100644
--- a/test/test_flake8.py
+++ b/test/test_flake8.py
@@ -5,21 +5,27 @@
 from pathlib import Path
 import sys
 
-from flake8 import LOG
-from flake8.api.legacy import get_style_guide
+import pytest
 
 
-# avoid debug and info messages from flake8 internals
-LOG.setLevel(logging.WARN)
+@pytest.mark.flake8
+@pytest.mark.linter
+def test_flake8():
+    from flake8.api.legacy import get_style_guide
 
+    # avoid debug / info / warning messages from flake8 internals
+    logging.getLogger('flake8').setLevel(logging.ERROR)
+
+    # for some reason the pydocstyle logger changes to an effective level of 1
+    # set higher level to prevent the output to be flooded with debug messages
+    logging.getLogger('pydocstyle').setLevel(logging.WARNING)
 
-def test_flake8():
     style_guide = get_style_guide(
-        ignore=['D100', 'D104'],
+        extend_ignore=['D100', 'D104'],
         show_source=True,
     )
     style_guide_tests = get_style_guide(
-        ignore=['D100', 'D101', 'D102', 'D103', 'D104', 'D105', 'D107'],
+        extend_ignore=['D100', 'D101', 'D102', 'D103', 'D104', 'D105', 'D107'],
         show_source=True,
     )
 
@@ -38,10 +44,11 @@ def test_flake8():
     if total_errors:  # pragma: no cover
         # output summary with per-category counts
         print()
-        report._application.formatter.show_statistics(report._stats)
-        print(
-            'flake8 reported {total_errors} errors'
-            .format_map(locals()), file=sys.stderr)
-
-    assert not report.total_errors, \
-        'flake8 reported {total_errors} errors'.format_map(locals())
+        if report.total_errors:
+            report._application.formatter.show_statistics(report._stats)
+        if report_tests.total_errors:
+            report_tests._application.formatter.show_statistics(
+                report_tests._stats)
+        print(f'flake8 reported {total_errors} errors', file=sys.stderr)
+
+    assert not total_errors, f'flake8 reported {total_errors} errors'
diff --git a/test/test_spell_check.py b/test/test_spell_check.py
index e60a791..677efdc 100644
--- a/test/test_spell_check.py
+++ b/test/test_spell_check.py
@@ -1,45 +1,59 @@
-# Copyright 2016-2018 Dirk Thomas
+# Copyright 2016-2019 Dirk Thomas
 # Licensed under the Apache License, Version 2.0
 
 from pathlib import Path
 
-from pylint.lint import Run
 import pytest
 
-
 spell_check_words_path = Path(__file__).parent / 'spell_check.words'
 
 
-def test_spell_check():
+@pytest.fixture(scope='module')
+def known_words():
     global spell_check_words_path
+    return spell_check_words_path.read_text().splitlines()
 
-    try:
-        import enchant  # noqa: F401
-    except ImportError:  # pragma: no cover
-        pytest.skip(
-            "Skipping spell checking tests since 'enchant' was not found")
-
-    try:
-        Run([
-            '--disable=all',
-            '--enable=spelling',
-            '--spelling-dict=en_US',
-            '--ignore-comments=no',
-            '--spelling-private-dict-file=' + str(spell_check_words_path),
-            str(Path(__file__).parents[1] / 'colcon_lcov_result'),
-        ] + [
-            str(p) for p in
-            (Path(__file__).parents[1] / 'test').glob('**/*.py')
-        ])
-    except SystemExit as e:
-        assert not e.code, 'Some spell checking errors'
-    else:
-        assert False, 'The pylint API is supposed to raise a SystemExit'
-
-
-def test_spell_check_word_list():
-    global spell_check_words_path
-    with spell_check_words_path.open('r') as h:
-        lines = h.read().splitlines()
-    assert lines == sorted(lines), \
+
+@pytest.mark.linter
+def test_spell_check(known_words):
+    from scspell import Report
+    from scspell import SCSPELL_BUILTIN_DICT
+    from scspell import spell_check
+
+    source_filenames = [Path(__file__).parents[1] / 'setup.py'] + \
+        list(
+            (Path(__file__).parents[1] / 'colcon_lcov_result')
+            .glob('**/*.py')) + \
+        list((Path(__file__).parents[1] / 'test').glob('**/*.py'))
+
+    for source_filename in sorted(source_filenames):
+        print('Spell checking:', source_filename)
+
+    # check all files
+    report = Report(known_words)
+    spell_check(
+        [str(p) for p in source_filenames], base_dicts=[SCSPELL_BUILTIN_DICT],
+        report_only=report, additional_extensions=[('', 'Python')])
+
+    unknown_word_count = len(report.unknown_words)
+    assert unknown_word_count == 0, \
+        f'Found {unknown_word_count} unknown words: ' + \
+        ', '.join(sorted(report.unknown_words))
+
+    unused_known_words = set(known_words) - report.found_known_words
+    unused_known_word_count = len(unused_known_words)
+    assert unused_known_word_count == 0, \
+        f'{unused_known_word_count} words in the word list are not used: ' + \
+        ', '.join(sorted(unused_known_words))
+
+
+@pytest.mark.linter
+def test_spell_check_word_list_order(known_words):
+    assert known_words == sorted(known_words), \
         'The word list should be ordered alphabetically'
+
+
+@pytest.mark.linter
+def test_spell_check_word_list_duplicates(known_words):
+    assert len(known_words) == len(set(known_words)), \
+        'The word list should not contain duplicates'