diff --git a/CHANGELOG.md b/CHANGELOG.md
index 22962ff584..312af25841 100644
--- a/CHANGELOG.md
+++ b/CHANGELOG.md
@@ -17,6 +17,7 @@ and this project adheres to [Semantic Versioning](https://semver.org/spec/v2.0.0
 
 ### Fixed
 - `WakuMessage.payloadAsUtf8` returning garbage on utf-8 non-ascii characters.
+- `ChatMessage.payloadAsUtf8` returning garbage on utf-8 non-ascii characters.
 
 ## [0.9.0] - 2021-07-26
 
diff --git a/src/lib/chat_message/index.ts b/src/lib/chat_message/index.ts
index 04e3389d17..2ebceb1f68 100644
--- a/src/lib/chat_message/index.ts
+++ b/src/lib/chat_message/index.ts
@@ -60,10 +60,6 @@ export class ChatMessage {
       return '';
     }
 
-    return Array.from(this.proto.payload)
-      .map((char) => {
-        return String.fromCharCode(char);
-      })
-      .join('');
+    return Buffer.from(this.proto.payload).toString('utf-8');
   }
 }