diff --git a/CHANGELOG.md b/CHANGELOG.md
index 0b10e083..38d2a395 100644
--- a/CHANGELOG.md
+++ b/CHANGELOG.md
@@ -50,6 +50,7 @@
   sometimes not showing up, caused by invalidly sized surface buffers
   when output scaling was enabled
   (https://codeberg.org/dnkl/foot/issues/409).
+* Empty sixels resulted in non-empty images.
 
 
 ### Security
diff --git a/sixel.c b/sixel.c
index 3953f735..cac60493 100644
--- a/sixel.c
+++ b/sixel.c
@@ -48,7 +48,7 @@ sixel_init(struct terminal *term, int p1, int p2, int p3)
 
     term->sixel.state = SIXEL_DECSIXEL;
     term->sixel.pos = (struct coord){0, 0};
-    term->sixel.max_non_empty_row_no = 0;
+    term->sixel.max_non_empty_row_no = -1;
     term->sixel.row_byte_ofs = 0;
     term->sixel.color_idx = 0;
     term->sixel.param = 0;
@@ -726,6 +726,11 @@ sixel_unhook(struct terminal *term)
         term->sixel.image.height = term->sixel.max_non_empty_row_no + 1;
     }
 
+    if (term->sixel.image.height == 0 || term->sixel.image.width == 0) {
+        /* We won’t be emitting any sixels - free backing image */
+        free(term->sixel.image.data);
+    }
+
     int pixel_row_idx = 0;
     int pixel_rows_left = term->sixel.image.height;
     const int stride = term->sixel.image.width * sizeof(uint32_t);
@@ -1032,7 +1037,7 @@ sixel_add(struct terminal *term, int col, int width, uint32_t color, uint8_t six
     size_t ofs = term->sixel.row_byte_ofs + col;
     uint32_t *data = &term->sixel.image.data[ofs];
 
-    int max_non_empty_row = 0;
+    int max_non_empty_row = -1;
     int row = term->sixel.pos.row;
 
     for (int i = 0; i < 6; i++, sixel >>= 1, data += width) {
@@ -1175,7 +1180,11 @@ decgra(struct terminal *term, uint8_t c)
             ph <= term->sixel.max_height && pv <= term->sixel.max_width)
         {
             resize(term, ph, pv);
-            term->sixel.max_non_empty_row_no = pv - 1;
+            if (!term->sixel.transparent_bg) {
+                /* This ensures the sixel’s final image size is *at
+                 * least* this large */
+                term->sixel.max_non_empty_row_no = pv - 1;
+            }
         }
 
         term->sixel.state = SIXEL_DECSIXEL;