diff --git a/src/embedding_wrapper.c b/src/embedding_wrapper.c
index 18526873..3080ee81 100644
--- a/src/embedding_wrapper.c
+++ b/src/embedding_wrapper.c
@@ -57,8 +57,23 @@ void set_depot_load_path(const char *root_dir) {
 
 // main function (windows UTF16 -> UTF8 argument conversion code copied from
 // julia's ui/repl.c)
+#ifdef _WIN32
+int wmain(int argc, wchar_t *wargv[], wchar_t *envp[]) {
+    char **argv = (char **)malloc(sizeof(char *) * argc);
+    if (!argv) return 1;
+
+    for (int i = 0; i < argc; i++) { // write the command line to UTF8
+        wchar_t *warg = wargv[i];
+        size_t len = WideCharToMultiByte(CP_UTF8, 0, warg, -1, NULL, 0, NULL, NULL);
+        if (!len) return 1;
+        char *arg = (char *)malloc(len);
+        if (!WideCharToMultiByte(CP_UTF8, 0, warg, -1, arg, len, NULL, NULL)) return 1;
+        argv[i] = arg;
+    }
+#else
 int main(int argc, char *argv[]) {
-    argv = uv_setup_args(argc, argv); // no-op on Windows
+    argv = uv_setup_args(argc, argv);
+#endif
 
     // Find where eventual julia arguments start
     int program_argc = argc;
diff --git a/src/juliaconfig.jl b/src/juliaconfig.jl
index 0d6f2fb0..66eb1673 100644
--- a/src/juliaconfig.jl
+++ b/src/juliaconfig.jl
@@ -61,6 +61,9 @@ function cflags()
     if Sys.isunix()
         print(flags, " -fPIC")
     end
+    if Sys.iswindows()
+        print(flags, " -municode")
+    end
     return String(take!(flags))
 end
 
diff --git a/test/runtests.jl b/test/runtests.jl
index a02e20a0..4ead21bc 100644
--- a/test/runtests.jl
+++ b/test/runtests.jl
@@ -140,7 +140,7 @@ end
             rm(joinpath(new_depot, "artifacts"); recursive=true, force=true)
             end # try
             app_path(app_name) = abspath(app_compiled_dir, "bin", app_name * (Sys.iswindows() ? ".exe" : ""))
-            app_output = read(`$(app_path("MyApp")) I get --args --julia-args --threads=3 --check-bounds=yes -O1`, String)
+            app_output = read(`$(app_path("MyApp")) I get --args áéíóú --julia-args --threads=3 --check-bounds=yes -O1`, String)
 
             # Check stdlib filtering
             if filter == true
@@ -159,7 +159,7 @@ end
             # Check artifact gets run from the correct place
             @test occursin("HelloWorld artifact at $(realpath(app_compiled_dir))", app_output)
             # Check ARGS
-            @test occursin("""ARGS = ["I", "get", "--args"]""", app_output)
+            @test occursin("""ARGS = ["I", "get", "--args", "áéíóú"]""", app_output)
             # Check julia-args
             @test occursin("(Base.JLOptions()).opt_level = 1", app_output)
             @test occursin("(Base.JLOptions()).nthreads = 3", app_output)