diff --git a/vllm_mlx/scheduler.py b/vllm_mlx/scheduler.py
index 88d144cb7..38dbdde75 100644
--- a/vllm_mlx/scheduler.py
+++ b/vllm_mlx/scheduler.py
@@ -20,6 +20,7 @@
 import mlx.core as mx
 from mlx_lm.generate import BatchGenerator
 from mlx_lm.sample_utils import make_sampler
+from mlx_lm.tokenizer_utils import NaiveStreamingDetokenizer
 
 from .memory_cache import MemoryAwarePrefixCache, MemoryCacheConfig
 from .paged_cache import PagedCacheManager
@@ -1043,6 +1044,12 @@ def __init__(
         # CPython GIL guarantees set.add() and `x in set` are atomic.
         self._pending_abort_ids: Set[str] = set()
 
+        # Per-request streaming detokenizers for UTF-8-safe incremental decode.
+        # Raw tokenizer.decode([token]) splits multi-byte codepoints (emoji,
+        # CJK) into surrogate pairs.  NaiveStreamingDetokenizer buffers
+        # incomplete byte sequences and only emits valid UTF-8 segments.
+        self._detokenizer_pool: Dict[str, Any] = {}
+
         # Statistics
         self.num_requests_processed = 0
         self.total_prompt_tokens = 0
@@ -1688,6 +1695,7 @@ def _do_abort_request(self, request_id: str) -> bool:
         if request is not None:
             request.set_finished(RequestStatus.FINISHED_ABORTED)
         self.finished_req_ids.add(request_id)
+        self._detokenizer_pool.pop(request_id, None)
 
         # Flush Metal encoders after removing arrays from batch
         mx.clear_cache()
@@ -1848,11 +1856,23 @@ def _process_batch_responses(
 
                 request.first_token_time = _time.time()
 
-            # Decode the new token (skip stop tokens — they are not content)
+            # Decode the new token using streaming detokenizer (UTF-8 safe).
+            # Raw tokenizer.decode([token]) produces surrogate pairs for
+            # multi-byte codepoints (emoji, CJK) in continuous batching.
             if response.finish_reason == "stop":
                 new_text = ""
             else:
-                new_text = self._decode_tokens([response.token])
+                if request_id not in self._detokenizer_pool:
+                    tokenizer = self.tokenizer
+                    if hasattr(tokenizer, "detokenizer"):
+                        detok = tokenizer.detokenizer
+                    else:
+                        detok = NaiveStreamingDetokenizer(tokenizer)
+                    detok.reset()
+                    self._detokenizer_pool[request_id] = detok
+                detok = self._detokenizer_pool[request_id]
+                detok.add_token(response.token)
+                new_text = detok.last_segment
 
             # Create output
             output = RequestOutput(
@@ -1875,8 +1895,13 @@ def _process_batch_responses(
                 output.finish_reason = response.finish_reason
                 finished_ids.add(request_id)
 
-                # Decode full output
-                output.output_text = self._decode_tokens(request.output_token_ids)
+                # Finalize streaming detokenizer for full output
+                detok = self._detokenizer_pool.pop(request_id, None)
+                if detok is not None:
+                    detok.finalize()
+                    output.output_text = detok.text
+                else:
+                    output.output_text = self._decode_tokens(request.output_token_ids)
                 request.output_text = output.output_text
 
                 # Extract cache for future reuse (critical for agentic multi-turn)
@@ -1920,6 +1945,8 @@ def _process_batch_responses(
     def _cleanup_finished(self, finished_ids: Set[str]) -> None:
         """Clean up finished requests and store caches for reuse."""
         for request_id in finished_ids:
+            # Safety-net detokenizer cleanup (normally popped in _process_batch_responses)
+            self._detokenizer_pool.pop(request_id, None)
             request = self.running.get(request_id)
 
             # Store cache for future reuse
@@ -2399,6 +2426,7 @@ def reset(self) -> None:
         self.finished_req_ids.clear()
         self.request_id_to_uid.clear()
         self.uid_to_request_id.clear()
+        self._detokenizer_pool.clear()
         self._close_batch_generator()
         self._current_sampler_params = None