diff --git a/CHANGELOG.md b/CHANGELOG.md
index b1150ed680ba..ae28119ce22e 100644
--- a/CHANGELOG.md
+++ b/CHANGELOG.md
@@ -13,6 +13,7 @@ and this project adheres to [Semantic Versioning](https://semver.org/spec/v2.0.0
 - Don't emit `@config` in CSS when watching via the CLI ([#12327](https://github.com/tailwindlabs/tailwindcss/pull/12327))
 - Improve types for `resolveConfig` ([#12272](https://github.com/tailwindlabs/tailwindcss/pull/12272))
 - Ensure configured `font-feature-settings` for `mono` are included in Preflight ([#12342](https://github.com/tailwindlabs/tailwindcss/pull/12342))
+- Don't crash when given applying a variant to a negated version of a simple utility ([#12514](https://github.com/tailwindlabs/tailwindcss/pull/12514))
 
 ## [3.3.5] - 2023-10-25
 
diff --git a/src/lib/generateRules.js b/src/lib/generateRules.js
index 69b6827733e7..57bb1d140cd3 100644
--- a/src/lib/generateRules.js
+++ b/src/lib/generateRules.js
@@ -845,6 +845,11 @@ function applyFinalFormat(match, { context, candidate }) {
     return null
   }
 
+  // If all rules have been eliminated we can skip this candidate entirely
+  if (container.nodes.length === 0) {
+    return null
+  }
+
   match[1] = container.nodes[0]
 
   return match
diff --git a/tests/negative-prefix.test.js b/tests/negative-prefix.test.js
index c799bb54ecb4..d352c1d63e0e 100644
--- a/tests/negative-prefix.test.js
+++ b/tests/negative-prefix.test.js
@@ -343,4 +343,24 @@ crosscheck(() => {
       return expect(result.css).toMatchCss(css``)
     })
   })
+
+  // This is a weird test but it used to crash because the negative prefix + variant used to cause an undefined utility to be generated
+  test('addUtilities without negative prefix + variant + negative prefix in content should not crash', async () => {
+    let config = {
+      content: [{ raw: html`<div class="hover:-top-lg"></div>` }],
+      plugins: [
+        ({ addUtilities }) => {
+          addUtilities({
+            '.top-lg': {
+              top: '6rem',
+            },
+          })
+        },
+      ],
+    }
+
+    let result = await run('@tailwind utilities', config)
+
+    expect(result.css).toMatchCss(css``)
+  })
 })