diff --git a/CHANGELOG.md b/CHANGELOG.md
index fd16e98..94488f2 100644
--- a/CHANGELOG.md
+++ b/CHANGELOG.md
@@ -12,7 +12,8 @@ and this project adheres to [Semantic Versioning](https://semver.org/spec/v2.0.0
 
 ### Changed
 
-- (BUILD) [#176] The Maven Central deployed pom.xml properly includes runtime dependencies
+- (BUILD) [#176] The Maven Central deployed `pom.xml` properly includes runtime dependencies
+- (BUILD) [#175] The `.zip` file created from `maven-assembly-plugin` no longer contains the standalone validator, which reduces its size to 50%
 
 ## 1.6.0 - 2025-11-07
 
diff --git a/src/assembly/assembly-dist.xml b/src/assembly/assembly-dist.xml
index 597eec6..d091b08 100644
--- a/src/assembly/assembly-dist.xml
+++ b/src/assembly/assembly-dist.xml
@@ -20,6 +20,10 @@
             <includes>
                 <include>validator-*.jar</include>
             </includes>
+            <!-- excludes always win over includes if both patterns match -->
+            <excludes>
+                <exclude>*standalone.jar</exclude>
+            </excludes>
         </fileSet>
 
     </fileSets>