diff --git a/runelite-client/src/main/java/net/runelite/client/config/ConfigManager.java b/runelite-client/src/main/java/net/runelite/client/config/ConfigManager.java
index be4b980593..8cb35728d0 100644
--- a/runelite-client/src/main/java/net/runelite/client/config/ConfigManager.java
+++ b/runelite-client/src/main/java/net/runelite/client/config/ConfigManager.java
@@ -36,9 +36,12 @@ import java.io.FileInputStream;
 import java.io.FileNotFoundException;
 import java.io.FileOutputStream;
 import java.io.IOException;
+import java.io.InputStreamReader;
+import java.io.OutputStreamWriter;
 import java.lang.reflect.Method;
 import java.lang.reflect.Modifier;
 import java.lang.reflect.Proxy;
+import java.nio.charset.Charset;
 import java.time.Instant;
 import java.util.Arrays;
 import java.util.Comparator;
@@ -179,7 +182,7 @@ public class ConfigManager
 
 		try (FileInputStream in = new FileInputStream(propertiesFile))
 		{
-			properties.load(in);
+			properties.load(new InputStreamReader(in, Charset.forName("UTF-8")));
 		}
 		catch (FileNotFoundException ex)
 		{
@@ -226,7 +229,7 @@ public class ConfigManager
 
 		try (FileOutputStream out = new FileOutputStream(propertiesFile))
 		{
-			properties.store(out, "RuneLite configuration");
+			properties.store(new OutputStreamWriter(out, Charset.forName("UTF-8")), "RuneLite configuration");
 		}
 	}