diff --git a/src/torchmetrics/functional/text/bert.py b/src/torchmetrics/functional/text/bert.py
index cfdb8c743b4..18a1ae94ef6 100644
--- a/src/torchmetrics/functional/text/bert.py
+++ b/src/torchmetrics/functional/text/bert.py
@@ -354,6 +354,8 @@ def bert_score(
         preds = list(preds)
     if not isinstance(target, (str, list, dict)):  # dict for BERTScore class compute call
         target = list(target)
+    if not isinstance(idf, bool):
+        raise ValueError(f"The value of idf must be a boolean. Value passed:{idf=}")
 
     if verbose and (not _TQDM_AVAILABLE):
         raise ModuleNotFoundError(
diff --git a/tests/unittests/text/test_bertscore.py b/tests/unittests/text/test_bertscore.py
index dfd6d60a0e5..230514b9091 100644
--- a/tests/unittests/text/test_bertscore.py
+++ b/tests/unittests/text/test_bertscore.py
@@ -175,7 +175,7 @@ def test_bertscore_differentiability(
 @skip_on_connection_issues()
 @pytest.mark.skipif(not _TRANSFORMERS_GREATER_EQUAL_4_4, reason="test requires transformers>4.4")
 @pytest.mark.parametrize(
-    "idf",
+    ["idf"],
     [(False,), (True,)],
 )
 def test_bertscore_sorting(idf: bool):