diff --git a/server/src/main/java/org/elasticsearch/search/aggregations/metrics/ValueCountAggregator.java b/server/src/main/java/org/elasticsearch/search/aggregations/metrics/ValueCountAggregator.java
index 3887565dc35..dd4ef7dfdd7 100644
--- a/server/src/main/java/org/elasticsearch/search/aggregations/metrics/ValueCountAggregator.java
+++ b/server/src/main/java/org/elasticsearch/search/aggregations/metrics/ValueCountAggregator.java
@@ -20,6 +20,7 @@ package org.elasticsearch.search.aggregations.metrics;
 
 import org.apache.lucene.index.LeafReaderContext;
 import org.apache.lucene.index.SortedNumericDocValues;
+import org.apache.lucene.search.ScoreMode;
 import org.elasticsearch.common.lease.Releasables;
 import org.elasticsearch.common.util.BigArrays;
 import org.elasticsearch.common.util.LongArray;
@@ -125,6 +126,11 @@ public class ValueCountAggregator extends NumericMetricsAggregator.SingleValue {
         return new InternalValueCount(name, counts.get(bucket), metadata());
     }
 
+    @Override
+    public ScoreMode scoreMode() {
+        return valuesSource != null && valuesSource.needsScores() ? ScoreMode.COMPLETE : ScoreMode.COMPLETE_NO_SCORES;
+    }
+
     @Override
     public InternalAggregation buildEmptyAggregation() {
         return new InternalValueCount(name, 0L, metadata());