diff --git a/src/tokenizer.cpp b/src/tokenizer.cpp
index 05fc85533..6c7f6700b 100644
--- a/src/tokenizer.cpp
+++ b/src/tokenizer.cpp
@@ -807,6 +807,7 @@ bool move_word_state_machine_t::consume_char_path_components(wchar_t c) {
 }
 
 bool move_word_state_machine_t::consume_char_whitespace(wchar_t c) {
+    // Consume a "word" of printable characters plus any leading whitespace.
     enum { s_always_one = 0, s_blank, s_graph, s_end };
 
     bool consumed = false;
@@ -814,7 +815,13 @@ bool move_word_state_machine_t::consume_char_whitespace(wchar_t c) {
         switch (state) {
             case s_always_one: {
                 consumed = true;  // always consume the first character
-                state = s_blank;
+                // If it's a graphical char, only consume those from here.
+                if (iswgraph(c)) {
+                    state = s_graph;
+                } else {
+                    // If it's whitespace, keep consuming whitespace until the graphs.
+                    state = s_blank;
+                }
                 break;
             }
             case s_blank: {
diff --git a/tests/pexpects/bind.py b/tests/pexpects/bind.py
index 1f331c6eb..660581807 100644
--- a/tests/pexpects/bind.py
+++ b/tests/pexpects/bind.py
@@ -276,3 +276,16 @@ sendline("bind q self-insert-notfirst")
 expect_prompt()
 sendline("qqqecho qqq")
 expect_prompt("qqq", unmatched="Leading qs not stripped")
+
+# Test bigword with single-character words.
+sendline("bind \cg kill-bigword")
+expect_prompt()
+send("a b c d\x01") # ctrl-a, move back to the beginning of the line
+send("\x07") # ctrl-g, kill bigword
+sendline("echo")
+expect_prompt("^b c d")
+
+send("    a b c d\x01") # ctrl-a, move back to the beginning of the line
+send("\x07") # ctrl-g, kill bigword
+sendline("echo")
+expect_prompt("^b c d")