diff --git a/kitty/screen.c b/kitty/screen.c
index 5c1343e47..55f3d3046 100644
--- a/kitty/screen.c
+++ b/kitty/screen.c
@@ -1101,6 +1101,11 @@ draw_control_char(Screen *self, text_loop_state *s, uint32_t ch) {
     }
 }
 
+static bool
+is_roundtripped_zero_width_char(char_type ch) {
+    return ch == 0xad || ch == 0x200b || ch == 0x2060;
+}
+
 static void
 draw_text_loop(Screen *self, const uint32_t *chars, size_t num_chars, text_loop_state *s) {
     init_text_loop_line(self, s);
@@ -1122,7 +1127,7 @@ draw_text_loop(Screen *self, const uint32_t *chars, size_t num_chars, text_loop_
                 // check for some zero width chars that we want to preserve for
                 // round tripping that are not added to prev cell by grapheme
                 // segmentation.
-                if (s->prev.cc && (ch == 0xad || ch == 0x200b || ch == 0x2060)) {  // soft hyphen, zero width space, word joiner
+                if (s->prev.cc && is_roundtripped_zero_width_char(ch)) {  // soft hyphen, zero width space, word joiner
                     draw_combining_char(self, s, ch);
                 }
                 continue;  // we cannot represent zero width chars except as combining chars
@@ -1312,10 +1317,11 @@ screen_handle_multicell_command(Screen *self, const MultiCellCommand *cmd, const
             char_type ch = self->lc->chars[i];
             CharProps cp = char_props_for(ch);
             if (cp.is_invalid) continue;
-            if ((s = grapheme_segmentation_step(s, cp)).add_to_current_cell) lc.chars[lc.count++] = ch;
+            if ((s = grapheme_segmentation_step(s, cp)).add_to_current_cell || (wcwidth_std(cp) == 0 && is_roundtripped_zero_width_char(ch) && lc.count)) lc.chars[lc.count++] = ch;
             else {
                 if (lc.count) handle_variable_width_multicell_command(self, mcd, &lc);
-                lc.chars[0] = ch; lc.count = 1;
+                if (wcwidth_std(cp) < 1) lc.count = 0;
+                else { lc.chars[0] = ch; lc.count = 1; }
             }
         }
         if (lc.count) handle_variable_width_multicell_command(self, mcd, &lc);
diff --git a/kitty_tests/multicell.py b/kitty_tests/multicell.py
index 94c2010c9..42ee5d85c 100644
--- a/kitty_tests/multicell.py
+++ b/kitty_tests/multicell.py
@@ -141,6 +141,13 @@ def test_multicell(self: TestMulticell) -> None:
         for x in range(s.columns):
             ac(x, y, is_multicell=True, x=x, y=y)
 
+    # Test zero width roundtripping
+    for preserved in '\xad\u200b\u2060':
+        s.reset()
+        multicell(s, f'|{preserved}|', scale=2)
+        assert_cursor_at(4, 0)
+        ac(0, 0, text=f'|{preserved}')
+
     # Test wrapping
     s = self.create_screen(cols=6, lines=6)
     s.draw('x' * (s.columns - 1))