diff --git a/src/test/tokenize_parser_test.cpp b/src/test/tokenize_parser_test.cpp
index 9c45d9a108..21e8bae46d 100644
--- a/src/test/tokenize_parser_test.cpp
+++ b/src/test/tokenize_parser_test.cpp
@@ -154,7 +154,7 @@ TEST(TokenizeDeserialization, invalidTokenizeMaxLengthType) {
     auto status = ovms::TokenizeParser::parseTokenizeRequest(d, request);
     ASSERT_NE(status, absl::OkStatus());
     auto error = status.message();
-    ASSERT_EQ(error, "max_length should be integer");
+    ASSERT_EQ(error, "max_length should be unsigned integer");
 }
 
 TEST(TokenizeDeserialization, invalidTokenizePadToMaxLengthType) {
@@ -228,3 +228,39 @@ TEST(TokenizeDeserialization, invalidTokenizePaddingSideValue) {
     auto error = status.message();
     ASSERT_EQ(error, "padding_side should be either left or right");
 }
+
+TEST(TokenizeDeserialization, invalidTokenizeMaxLengthNegative) {
+    std::string requestBody = R"(
+        {
+            "model": "embeddings",
+            "text": ["one", "two", "three"],
+            "max_length": -10
+        }
+    )";
+    rapidjson::Document d;
+    rapidjson::ParseResult ok = d.Parse(requestBody.c_str());
+    ovms::TokenizeRequest request;
+    ASSERT_EQ(ok.Code(), 0);
+    auto status = ovms::TokenizeParser::parseTokenizeRequest(d, request);
+    ASSERT_NE(status, absl::OkStatus());
+    auto error = status.message();
+    ASSERT_EQ(error, "max_length should be unsigned integer");
+}
+
+TEST(TokenizeDeserialization, invalidTokenizeMaxLengthZero) {
+    std::string requestBody = R"(
+        {
+            "model": "embeddings",
+            "text": ["one", "two", "three"],
+            "max_length": 0
+        }
+    )";
+    rapidjson::Document d;
+    rapidjson::ParseResult ok = d.Parse(requestBody.c_str());
+    ovms::TokenizeRequest request;
+    ASSERT_EQ(ok.Code(), 0);
+    auto status = ovms::TokenizeParser::parseTokenizeRequest(d, request);
+    ASSERT_NE(status, absl::OkStatus());
+    auto error = status.message();
+    ASSERT_EQ(error, "max_length should be greater than 0");
+}
diff --git a/src/tokenize/tokenize_parser.cpp b/src/tokenize/tokenize_parser.cpp
index 9f982491b3..f070606a23 100644
--- a/src/tokenize/tokenize_parser.cpp
+++ b/src/tokenize/tokenize_parser.cpp
@@ -81,13 +81,17 @@ std::variant<TokenizeRequest, std::string> TokenizeParser::validateTokenizeReque
 
     auto it = parsedJson.FindMember("max_length");
     if (it != parsedJson.MemberEnd()) {
-        if (it->value.IsInt()) {
-            size_t max_length = it->value.GetInt();
+        if (it->value.IsUint()) {
+            size_t max_length = it->value.GetUint();
+            if (max_length == 0) {
+                return "max_length should be greater than 0";
+            }
+
             request.parameters["max_length"] = max_length;
             // Keep OVMS tokenize API contract: max_length implies truncation.
             request.parameters["truncation"] = true;
         } else {
-            return "max_length should be integer";
+            return "max_length should be unsigned integer";
         }
     }
     it = parsedJson.FindMember("pad_to_max_length");