diff --git a/src/debug_toolbar/litestar/middleware.py b/src/debug_toolbar/litestar/middleware.py
index 4bf6d60..8b04efa 100644
--- a/src/debug_toolbar/litestar/middleware.py
+++ b/src/debug_toolbar/litestar/middleware.py
@@ -2,6 +2,7 @@
 
 from __future__ import annotations
 
+import contextlib
 import gzip
 import logging
 import re
@@ -492,26 +493,21 @@ def _inject_toolbar(self, body: bytes, context: RequestContext, content_encoding
             If gzip was decompressed, returns uncompressed body with empty encoding.
         """
         # Handle gzip-compressed responses
-        # Track whether we successfully decompressed the body
-        decompressed = False
+        # Store original body in case we need to return it
+        original_body = body
         encodings = [e.strip() for e in content_encoding.lower().split(",")] if content_encoding else []
         if "gzip" in encodings:
-            try:
+            # Try to decompress, fall back to treating as uncompressed if invalid
+            with contextlib.suppress(gzip.BadGzipFile):
                 body = gzip.decompress(body)
-                decompressed = True
-            except gzip.BadGzipFile:
-                # Not valid gzip, try to decode as-is
-                pass
 
         try:
             html = body.decode("utf-8")
         except UnicodeDecodeError:
-            # Can't decode. If we successfully decompressed gzip, return the
-            # decompressed body with no content-encoding. Otherwise, return
-            # the body as-is with the original encoding.
-            if decompressed:
-                return body, ""
-            return body, content_encoding
+            # Can't decode as UTF-8. Return the original body with original
+            # content-encoding to preserve HTTP semantics (client expects the
+            # format they requested via Accept-Encoding).
+            return original_body, content_encoding
 
         toolbar_data = self.toolbar.get_toolbar_data(context)
         toolbar_html = self._render_toolbar(toolbar_data)
diff --git a/tests/integration/test_litestar_middleware.py b/tests/integration/test_litestar_middleware.py
index 8a92396..4540bbd 100644
--- a/tests/integration/test_litestar_middleware.py
+++ b/tests/integration/test_litestar_middleware.py
@@ -5,11 +5,11 @@
 import gzip
 
 import pytest
+from litestar.status_codes import HTTP_200_OK
 from litestar.testing import TestClient
 
 from debug_toolbar.litestar import DebugToolbarPlugin, LitestarDebugToolbarConfig
 from litestar import Litestar, MediaType, Response, get
-from litestar.status_codes import HTTP_200_OK
 
 
 @get("/", media_type=MediaType.HTML)
@@ -277,7 +277,7 @@ def test_works_with_before_after_request(self) -> None:
         Note: We only verify before_request hook is called. The after_request
         hook timing varies in CI environments due to async execution order.
         """
-        from litestar import Request, Response
+        from litestar import Request
 
         hook_state: dict[str, bool] = {"before": False, "after": False}
 
@@ -378,7 +378,8 @@ def test_gzip_decompressed_data_fails_utf8_decoding(self) -> None:
         """Test handling of valid gzip data that fails UTF-8 decoding after decompression.
 
         When gzipped data decompresses successfully but contains non-UTF-8 bytes,
-        the middleware should return the original compressed data.
+        the middleware should return the original compressed data with the original
+        content-encoding header to preserve HTTP semantics.
         """
 
         @get("/binary-gzip", media_type=MediaType.HTML)
@@ -403,8 +404,9 @@ async def binary_gzip_handler() -> Response:
         with TestClient(app) as client:
             response = client.get("/binary-gzip")
             assert response.status_code == 200
-            # Should return decompressed binary data since UTF-8 decode failed
-            # The middleware has removed the gzip encoding, so we check for the raw binary content
+            # Should return original compressed data since UTF-8 decode failed
+            # TestClient automatically decompresses gzip responses, so we verify
+            # the decompressed content matches the original binary data
             assert response.content == b"\x80\x81\x82\x83\x84\x85\x86\x87\x88\x89"
 
     def test_gzip_header_case_insensitive(self) -> None: