diff --git a/NEWS b/NEWS
index 5c70836ebff..a0c16ca9092 100644
--- a/NEWS
+++ b/NEWS
@@ -16,6 +16,10 @@ PHP                                                                        NEWS
 - LibXML:
   . Fixed bug GH-14563 (Build failure with libxml2 v2.13.0). (nielsdos)
 
+- Output:
+  . Fixed bug GH-14808 (Unexpected null pointer in Zend/zend_string.h with
+    empty output buffer). (nielsdos)
+
 - PDO:
   . Fixed bug GH-14712 (Crash with PDORow access to null property).
     (David Carlier)
diff --git a/main/output.c b/main/output.c
index 57a61e4b936..c2cb0ceab01 100644
--- a/main/output.c
+++ b/main/output.c
@@ -360,7 +360,11 @@ PHPAPI int php_output_get_level(void)
 PHPAPI int php_output_get_contents(zval *p)
 {
 	if (OG(active)) {
-		ZVAL_STRINGL(p, OG(active)->buffer.data, OG(active)->buffer.used);
+		if (OG(active)->buffer.used) {
+			ZVAL_STRINGL(p, OG(active)->buffer.data, OG(active)->buffer.used);
+		} else {
+			ZVAL_EMPTY_STRING(p);
+		}
 		return SUCCESS;
 	} else {
 		ZVAL_NULL(p);
diff --git a/tests/output/gh14808.phpt b/tests/output/gh14808.phpt
new file mode 100644
index 00000000000..7a3f57ba51c
--- /dev/null
+++ b/tests/output/gh14808.phpt
@@ -0,0 +1,13 @@
+--TEST--
+GH-14808 (Unexpected null pointer in Zend/zend_string.h with empty output buffer)
+--FILE--
+<?php
+var_dump($args);
+ob_start('ob_iconv_handler');
+ob_clean();
+var_dump(ob_get_contents());
+?>
+--EXPECTF--
+Warning: Undefined variable $args in %s on line %d
+NULL
+string(0) ""