diff --git a/packages/http-crawler/src/internals/http-crawler.ts b/packages/http-crawler/src/internals/http-crawler.ts
index b84d35b0fa59..31c4cd1728a1 100644
--- a/packages/http-crawler/src/internals/http-crawler.ts
+++ b/packages/http-crawler/src/internals/http-crawler.ts
@@ -641,7 +641,7 @@ export class HttpCrawler<Context extends InternalHttpCrawlingContext<any, any, H
             };
         }
 
-        if (/PATCH|POST|PUT/.test(request.method)) requestOptions.body = request.payload;
+        if (/PATCH|POST|PUT/.test(request.method)) requestOptions.body = request.payload ?? '';
 
         return requestOptions;
     }
diff --git a/test/core/crawlers/http_crawler.test.ts b/test/core/crawlers/http_crawler.test.ts
index 39d89e4519dc..b071d0930f85 100644
--- a/test/core/crawlers/http_crawler.test.ts
+++ b/test/core/crawlers/http_crawler.test.ts
@@ -41,6 +41,11 @@ router.set('/redirectWithoutCookies', (req, res) => {
     res.end();
 });
 
+router.set('/echo', (req, res) => {
+    res.setHeader('content-type', 'text/html');
+    req.pipe(res);
+});
+
 let server: http.Server;
 let url: string;
 
@@ -231,3 +236,23 @@ test('no empty cookie header', async () => {
 
     expect(results).toStrictEqual([]);
 });
+
+test('POST with undefined (empty) payload', async () => {
+    const results: string[] = [];
+
+    const crawler = new HttpCrawler({
+        handlePageFunction: async ({ body }) => {
+            results.push(body.toString());
+        },
+    });
+
+    await crawler.run([
+        {
+            url: `${url}/echo`,
+            payload: undefined,
+            method: 'POST',
+        },
+    ]);
+
+    expect(results).toStrictEqual(['']);
+});