diff --git a/Python/codecs.c b/Python/codecs.c
index 6d1ae651fa00058..84a0589c8e8317e 100644
--- a/Python/codecs.c
+++ b/Python/codecs.c
@@ -1426,19 +1426,19 @@ _PyCodec_SurrogateEscapeUnicodeEncodeError(PyObject *exc)
         return NULL;
     }
 
-    PyObject *res = PyBytes_FromStringAndSize(NULL, slen);
-    if (res == NULL) {
+    PyBytesWriter *writer = PyBytesWriter_Create(slen);
+    if (writer == NULL) {
         Py_DECREF(obj);
         return NULL;
     }
 
-    char *outp = PyBytes_AsString(res);
+    char *outp = PyBytesWriter_GetData(writer);
     for (Py_ssize_t i = start; i < end; i++) {
         Py_UCS4 ch = PyUnicode_READ_CHAR(obj, i);
         if (ch < 0xdc80 || ch > 0xdcff) {
             /* Not a UTF-8b surrogate, fail with original exception. */
             Py_DECREF(obj);
-            Py_DECREF(res);
+            PyBytesWriter_Discard(writer);
             PyErr_SetObject(PyExceptionInstance_Class(exc), exc);
             return NULL;
         }
@@ -1446,6 +1446,8 @@ _PyCodec_SurrogateEscapeUnicodeEncodeError(PyObject *exc)
     }
     Py_DECREF(obj);
 
+    PyObject *res = PyBytesWriter_Finish(writer);
+    // Py_BuildValue() propagates the exception if res is NULL
     return Py_BuildValue("(Nn)", res, end);
 }