diff --git a/lib/logtail/log_devices/http.rb b/lib/logtail/log_devices/http.rb
index eeb6c7a..27539b9 100755
--- a/lib/logtail/log_devices/http.rb
+++ b/lib/logtail/log_devices/http.rb
@@ -215,9 +215,24 @@ def build_request(msgs)
 
         def force_utf8_encoding(data)
           if data.respond_to?(:force_encoding)
-            data.dup.force_encoding('UTF-8')
-          elsif data.respond_to?(:transform_values)
-            data.transform_values { |val| force_utf8_encoding(val) }
+            # Only valid UTF-8 may leave: Better Stack stores anything else as invalid JSON. A string
+            # that is valid UTF-8 already, as nearly all are, is sent as it is.
+            return data if data.valid_encoding? && (data.encoding == Encoding::UTF_8 || data.encoding == Encoding::US_ASCII)
+
+            case data.encoding
+            when Encoding::UTF_8, Encoding::BINARY, Encoding::US_ASCII
+              data.dup.force_encoding('UTF-8').scrub
+            else
+              begin
+                data.encode('UTF-8', invalid: :replace, undef: :replace)
+              rescue Encoding::ConverterNotFoundError
+                data.dup.force_encoding('UTF-8').scrub
+              end
+            end
+          elsif data.is_a?(Hash)
+            data.each_with_object({}) { |(key, val), hash| hash[force_utf8_encoding(key)] = force_utf8_encoding(val) }
+          elsif data.is_a?(Array)
+            data.map { |val| force_utf8_encoding(val) }
           else
             data
           end
diff --git a/lib/logtail/log_entry.rb b/lib/logtail/log_entry.rb
index 497e929..cd87bbd 100755
--- a/lib/logtail/log_entry.rb
+++ b/lib/logtail/log_entry.rb
@@ -35,7 +35,10 @@ def initialize(level, time, progname, message, context_snapshot, event, options
       # This follows the default behavior set by ::Logger
       # See: https://github.com/ruby/ruby/blob/trunk/lib/logger.rb#L615
       @message = message.is_a?(String) ? message : message.inspect
+      truncated = @message.bytesize > MESSAGE_MAX_BYTES
       @message = @message.byteslice(0, MESSAGE_MAX_BYTES)
+      # The cut can split a multibyte character in two, drop the part that is left
+      @message.scrub!("") if truncated
       @tags = options[:tags]
       @context_snapshot = context_snapshot
       @event = event
diff --git a/spec/logtail/log_devices/http_spec.rb b/spec/logtail/log_devices/http_spec.rb
index 2f6ac4e..d5145fe 100755
--- a/spec/logtail/log_devices/http_spec.rb
+++ b/spec/logtail/log_devices/http_spec.rb
@@ -119,6 +119,74 @@
     end
   end
 
+  # Testing a private method because it helps break down our tests
+  describe "#force_utf8_encoding" do
+    let(:http) { described_class.new("MYKEY", flush_continuously: false) }
+    let(:logger) { Logtail::Logger.new(http) }
+
+    # Flushes the buffer and decodes the single entry in the request, the way the API reads it.
+    def delivered_entry
+      http.send(:flush_async)
+      request = http.instance_variable_get(:@request_queue).deq.request
+      MessagePack.unpack(Zlib::Inflate.inflate(request.body)).first
+    end
+
+    it "replaces invalid bytes in the message with U+FFFD" do
+      logger.info("invalid \xFF\xFE bytes")
+      expect(delivered_entry["message"]).to eq("invalid �� bytes")
+    end
+
+    it "treats a binary message as UTF-8" do
+      logger.info("caf\xC3\xA9 \xFF".b)
+      expect(delivered_entry["message"]).to eq("café �")
+    end
+
+    it "replaces invalid bytes in a nested field" do
+      logger.info("nested", user: { name: "An\xFFn" })
+      expect(delivered_entry["user"]).to eq("name" => "An�n")
+    end
+
+    it "replaces invalid bytes in array elements" do
+      logger.info("array", items: ["valid", "\xFF\xFE".b, ["in\xFFner"]])
+      expect(delivered_entry["items"]).to eq(["valid", "��", ["in�ner"]])
+    end
+
+    it "replaces invalid bytes in hash keys" do
+      logger.info("keys", counts: { "k\xFFy".b => 1 })
+      expect(delivered_entry["counts"]).to eq("k�y" => 1)
+    end
+
+    it "replaces invalid bytes in the context" do
+      Logtail.with_context(request: { path: "/caf\xE9".b }) { logger.info("context") }
+      expect(delivered_entry["context"]["request"]).to eq("path" => "/caf�")
+    end
+
+    it "converts strings in other encodings to UTF-8" do
+      logger.info("latin-1", city: "Montr\xE9al".dup.force_encoding("ISO-8859-1"))
+      expect(delivered_entry["city"]).to eq("Montréal")
+    end
+
+    it "sends valid UTF-8 for a string in an encoding Ruby can't convert" do
+      logger.info("windows-1258", word: "caf\xE9".dup.force_encoding("Windows-1258"))
+      word = delivered_entry["word"]
+      expect(word).to start_with("caf")
+      expect(word).to be_valid_encoding
+    end
+
+    it "sends a string that is valid UTF-8 already as it is, without a copy" do
+      utf8 = "café"
+      ascii = "ascii".encode("US-ASCII")
+
+      expect(http.send(:force_utf8_encoding, utf8)).to be(utf8)
+      expect(http.send(:force_utf8_encoding, ascii)).to be(ascii)
+    end
+
+    it "treats a US-ASCII string with bytes above 127 as UTF-8" do
+      logger.info("us-ascii", word: "caf\xC3\xA9 \xFF".dup.force_encoding("US-ASCII"))
+      expect(delivered_entry["word"]).to eq("café �")
+    end
+  end
+
   # Outlet
   describe "#request_outlet" do
     let(:time) { Time.utc(2016, 9, 1, 12, 0, 0) }
diff --git a/spec/logtail/log_entry_spec.rb b/spec/logtail/log_entry_spec.rb
index 89cafac..dfa113e 100755
--- a/spec/logtail/log_entry_spec.rb
+++ b/spec/logtail/log_entry_spec.rb
@@ -33,4 +33,15 @@
       expect(hash[:context][:runtime][:frame_label].encoding.to_s).to eq('UTF-8')
     end
   end
+
+  describe "#message" do
+    it "cuts a long message on a character boundary" do
+      # The 4-byte emoji takes bytes 8,191 to 8,194, across the 8,192-byte limit.
+      message = "a" * 8190 + "\u{1F600} and more"
+      log_entry = described_class.new("INFO", time, nil, message, nil, nil)
+
+      expect(log_entry.message.bytesize).to eq(8190)
+      expect(log_entry.message.valid_encoding?).to be(true)
+    end
+  end
 end