diff --git a/x-pack/plugin/inference/src/main/java/org/elasticsearch/xpack/inference/chunking/SentenceBoundaryChunker.java b/x-pack/plugin/inference/src/main/java/org/elasticsearch/xpack/inference/chunking/SentenceBoundaryChunker.java
index 0924fc71f8665..f36dfb694a752 100644
--- a/x-pack/plugin/inference/src/main/java/org/elasticsearch/xpack/inference/chunking/SentenceBoundaryChunker.java
+++ b/x-pack/plugin/inference/src/main/java/org/elasticsearch/xpack/inference/chunking/SentenceBoundaryChunker.java
@@ -157,7 +157,7 @@ public List<String> chunk(String input, int maxNumberWordsPerChunk, boolean incl
 
         if (chunks.isEmpty()) {
             // The input did not chunk, return the entire input
-            chunks.add(new ChunkOffset(0, input.length()));
+            chunks.add(input);
         }
 
         return chunks;
diff --git a/x-pack/plugin/inference/src/test/java/org/elasticsearch/xpack/inference/chunking/WordBoundaryChunkerTests.java b/x-pack/plugin/inference/src/test/java/org/elasticsearch/xpack/inference/chunking/WordBoundaryChunkerTests.java
index 982e3643741d6..93f951bbfa983 100644
--- a/x-pack/plugin/inference/src/test/java/org/elasticsearch/xpack/inference/chunking/WordBoundaryChunkerTests.java
+++ b/x-pack/plugin/inference/src/test/java/org/elasticsearch/xpack/inference/chunking/WordBoundaryChunkerTests.java
@@ -227,6 +227,10 @@ public void testWhitespace() {
         assertThat(chunks, contains(" "));
     }
 
+    private List<String> textChunks(WordBoundaryChunker chunker, String input, int chunkSize, int overlap) {
+        return chunker.chunk(input, chunkSize, overlap);
+    }
+
     public void testBlankString() {
         var chunks = textChunks(new WordBoundaryChunker(), "   ", 100, 10);
         assertThat(chunks, hasSize(1));