diff --git a/CHANGELOG.md b/CHANGELOG.md
index b3513578..b625c28c 100644
--- a/CHANGELOG.md
+++ b/CHANGELOG.md
@@ -5,6 +5,10 @@ All notable changes to this project will be documented in this file.
 The format is based on [Keep a Changelog](https://keepachangelog.com/en/1.0.0/),
 and this project adheres to [Semantic Versioning](https://semver.org/spec/v2.0.0.html).
 
+## [4.0.0] - WIP
+### Fixed
+ - Astral characters are no longer encoded by dump/safeDump, #587.
+
 
 ## [3.14.0] - 2020-05-22
 ### Changed
@@ -479,6 +483,7 @@ and this project adheres to [Semantic Versioning](https://semver.org/spec/v2.0.0
 - First public release
 
 
+[4.0.0]: https://github.com/nodeca/js-yaml/compare/3.14.0...4.0.0
 [3.14.0]: https://github.com/nodeca/js-yaml/compare/3.13.1...3.14.0
 [3.13.1]: https://github.com/nodeca/js-yaml/compare/3.13.0...3.13.1
 [3.13.0]: https://github.com/nodeca/js-yaml/compare/3.12.2...3.13.0
diff --git a/lib/js-yaml/dumper.js b/lib/js-yaml/dumper.js
index df5ef096..5a0b126a 100644
--- a/lib/js-yaml/dumper.js
+++ b/lib/js-yaml/dumper.js
@@ -254,6 +254,19 @@ function isPlainSafeFirst(c) {
     && c !== CHAR_GRAVE_ACCENT;
 }
 
+// Same as 'string'.codePointAt(pos), but works in older browsers.
+function codePointAt(string, pos) {
+  var first = string.charCodeAt(pos), second;
+  if (first >= 0xD800 && first <= 0xDBFF && pos + 1 < string.length) {
+    second = string.charCodeAt(pos + 1);
+    if (second >= 0xDC00 && second <= 0xDFFF) {
+      // https://mathiasbynens.be/notes/javascript-encoding#surrogate-formulae
+      return (first - 0xD800) * 0x400 + second - 0xDC00 + 0x10000;
+    }
+  }
+  return first;
+}
+
 // Determines whether block indentation indicator is required.
 function needIndentIndicator(string) {
   var leadingSpaceRe = /^\n* /;
@@ -275,29 +288,30 @@ var STYLE_PLAIN   = 1,
 //    STYLE_FOLDED => a line > lineWidth and can be folded (and lineWidth != -1).
 function chooseScalarStyle(string, singleLineOnly, indentPerLevel, lineWidth, testAmbiguousType) {
   var i;
-  var char, prev_char;
+  var char = 0;
+  var prevChar = null;
   var hasLineBreak = false;
   var hasFoldableLine = false; // only checked if shouldTrackWidth
   var shouldTrackWidth = lineWidth !== -1;
   var previousLineBreak = -1; // count the first line correctly
-  var plain = isPlainSafeFirst(string.charCodeAt(0))
-          && !isWhitespace(string.charCodeAt(string.length - 1));
+  var plain = isPlainSafeFirst(codePointAt(string, 0))
+          && !isWhitespace(codePointAt(string, string.length - 1));
 
   if (singleLineOnly) {
     // Case: no block styles.
     // Check for disallowed characters to rule out plain and single.
-    for (i = 0; i < string.length; i++) {
-      char = string.charCodeAt(i);
+    for (i = 0; i < string.length; char >= 0x10000 ? i += 2 : i++) {
+      char = codePointAt(string, i);
       if (!isPrintable(char)) {
         return STYLE_DOUBLE;
       }
-      prev_char = i > 0 ? string.charCodeAt(i - 1) : null;
-      plain = plain && isPlainSafe(char, prev_char);
+      plain = plain && isPlainSafe(char, prevChar);
+      prevChar = char;
     }
   } else {
     // Case: block styles permitted.
-    for (i = 0; i < string.length; i++) {
-      char = string.charCodeAt(i);
+    for (i = 0; i < string.length; char >= 0x10000 ? i += 2 : i++) {
+      char = codePointAt(string, i);
       if (char === CHAR_LINE_FEED) {
         hasLineBreak = true;
         // Check if any line can be folded.
@@ -311,8 +325,8 @@ function chooseScalarStyle(string, singleLineOnly, indentPerLevel, lineWidth, te
       } else if (!isPrintable(char)) {
         return STYLE_DOUBLE;
       }
-      prev_char = i > 0 ? string.charCodeAt(i - 1) : null;
-      plain = plain && isPlainSafe(char, prev_char);
+      plain = plain && isPlainSafe(char, prevChar);
+      prevChar = char;
     }
     // in case the end is missing a \n
     hasFoldableLine = hasFoldableLine || (shouldTrackWidth &&
@@ -489,25 +503,19 @@ function foldLine(line, width) {
 // Escapes a double-quoted string.
 function escapeString(string) {
   var result = '';
-  var char, nextChar;
+  var char = 0;
   var escapeSeq;
 
-  for (var i = 0; i < string.length; i++) {
-    char = string.charCodeAt(i);
-    // Check for surrogate pairs (reference Unicode 3.0 section "3.7 Surrogates").
-    if (char >= 0xD800 && char <= 0xDBFF/* high surrogate */) {
-      nextChar = string.charCodeAt(i + 1);
-      if (nextChar >= 0xDC00 && nextChar <= 0xDFFF/* low surrogate */) {
-        // Combine the surrogate pair and store it escaped.
-        result += encodeHex((char - 0xD800) * 0x400 + nextChar - 0xDC00 + 0x10000);
-        // Advance index one extra since we already used that char here.
-        i++; continue;
-      }
-    }
+  for (var i = 0; i < string.length; char >= 0x10000 ? i += 2 : i++) {
+    char = codePointAt(string, i);
     escapeSeq = ESCAPE_SEQUENCES[char];
-    result += !escapeSeq && isPrintable(char)
-      ? string[i]
-      : escapeSeq || encodeHex(char);
+
+    if (!escapeSeq && isPrintable(char)) {
+      result += string[i];
+      if (char >= 0x10000) result += string[i + 1];
+    } else {
+      result += escapeSeq || encodeHex(char);
+    }
   }
 
   return result;
diff --git a/test/issues/0369.js b/test/issues/0369.js
deleted file mode 100644
index f96baac1..00000000
--- a/test/issues/0369.js
+++ /dev/null
@@ -1,11 +0,0 @@
-'use strict';
-
-
-var assert = require('assert');
-var yaml = require('../../');
-
-
-test('should dump astrals as codepoint', function () {
-  assert.deepEqual(yaml.safeDump('😀'), '"\\U0001F600"\n');
-  assert.deepEqual(yaml.safeLoad('"\\U0001F600"'), '😀');
-});
diff --git a/test/issues/0587.js b/test/issues/0587.js
new file mode 100644
index 00000000..91f33886
--- /dev/null
+++ b/test/issues/0587.js
@@ -0,0 +1,10 @@
+'use strict';
+
+
+var assert = require('assert');
+var yaml   = require('../../');
+
+
+test('Should not encode astral characters', function () {
+  assert.strictEqual(yaml.safeDump('😃😊'), '😃😊\n');
+});