diff --git a/docs/about/changelog.md b/docs/about/changelog.md
index f7d3298da..b25da30fd 100644
--- a/docs/about/changelog.md
+++ b/docs/about/changelog.md
@@ -8,6 +8,9 @@ priorities and future plans.
 
 - Preserve UTF-8 HTML octets through HTML::Parser and no-op entity decoding,
   restoring complete Thai text in HTML::Formatter output.
+
+- Return `undef` from false `if` expressions without an `else`, preserving
+  omitted optional arguments for `Params::Validate` and DateTime formatters.
 - Preserve caller-owned array and hash lifetimes across generated coercion
   callbacks, so `Types::Const` freezes cloned values without modifying the
   original reference.
diff --git a/src/main/java/org/perlonjava/backend/bytecode/BytecodeCompiler.java b/src/main/java/org/perlonjava/backend/bytecode/BytecodeCompiler.java
index 0c1b4b302..c3ce53ec9 100644
--- a/src/main/java/org/perlonjava/backend/bytecode/BytecodeCompiler.java
+++ b/src/main/java/org/perlonjava/backend/bytecode/BytecodeCompiler.java
@@ -7350,7 +7350,9 @@ public void visit(IfNode node) {
                 if (node.elseBranch != null) {
                     node.elseBranch.accept(this);
                 } else {
-                    lastResultReg = -1;
+                    // Perl returns the evaluated condition when an if without
+                    // an else does not take its branch.
+                    compileNode(node.condition, -1, RuntimeContextType.SCALAR);
                 }
             }
             return;
@@ -7417,11 +7419,21 @@ public void visit(IfNode node) {
 
             lastResultReg = thenResultReg >= 0 ? thenResultReg : elseResultReg;
         } else {
-            // No else block - patch if-false jump to here (after then block)
-            int endPos = bytecode.size();
-            patchIntOffset(ifFalsePos + 2, endPos);
+            // Perl returns the evaluated condition when an if without an else
+            // does not take its branch.  Materialize it in the conditional's
+            // result register so a skipped then branch cannot expose stale data.
+            int resultReg = thenResultReg >= 0 ? thenResultReg : allocateOutputRegister();
+            int gotoEndPos = bytecode.size();
+            emit(Opcodes.GOTO);
+            emitInt(0);
 
-            lastResultReg = thenResultReg;
+            int falseStart = bytecode.size();
+            patchIntOffset(ifFalsePos + 2, falseStart);
+            emitAliasWithTarget(resultReg, condReg);
+
+            int endPos = bytecode.size();
+            patchIntOffset(gotoEndPos + 1, endPos);
+            lastResultReg = resultReg;
         }
         symbolTable.exitScope(ifScopeIndex);
     }
diff --git a/src/main/java/org/perlonjava/backend/jvm/EmitStatement.java b/src/main/java/org/perlonjava/backend/jvm/EmitStatement.java
index 5fda88ef7..246a271d1 100644
--- a/src/main/java/org/perlonjava/backend/jvm/EmitStatement.java
+++ b/src/main/java/org/perlonjava/backend/jvm/EmitStatement.java
@@ -464,8 +464,8 @@ public static void emitIf(EmitterVisitor emitterVisitor, IfNode node) {
                         emitterVisitor.ctx.javaClassInfo.popGotoLabels();
                     }
                 } else {
-                    // No else branch - emit condition value if not void context
-                    // Perl returns the condition value when no branch is taken
+                    // No else branch - Perl returns the condition value when
+                    // no branch is taken.
                     if (emitterVisitor.ctx.contextType != RuntimeContextType.VOID) {
                         node.condition.accept(emitterVisitor.with(RuntimeContextType.SCALAR));
                     }
@@ -489,7 +489,7 @@ public static void emitIf(EmitterVisitor emitterVisitor, IfNode node) {
         Label endLabel = new Label();
 
         // When there's no else branch and we need a result value, DUP the condition
-        // so the condition value is returned when no branch is taken (Perl semantics)
+        // so the condition value is returned when no branch is taken (Perl semantics).
         boolean needConditionValue = (node.elseBranch == null && emitterVisitor.ctx.contextType != RuntimeContextType.VOID);
 
         // An elsif is an else-branch AST child rather than an EmitBlock statement,
diff --git a/src/test/resources/unit/params_validate_optional_argument.t b/src/test/resources/unit/params_validate_optional_argument.t
new file mode 100644
index 000000000..c1c3766d1
--- /dev/null
+++ b/src/test/resources/unit/params_validate_optional_argument.t
@@ -0,0 +1,57 @@
+use strict;
+use warnings;
+use Test::More;
+
+sub validate_named_arguments {
+    my %input = @_;
+    my %specification = (
+        required => { optional => 0 },
+        optional => { optional => 1 },
+    );
+    my %arguments;
+
+    OUTER: for my $name (qw(required optional)) {
+        my $value = do {
+            if (exists $specification{$name}{default}) {
+                $specification{$name}{default};
+            }
+        } || do {
+            next OUTER if $specification{$name}{optional} && !exists $input{$name};
+            $input{$name};
+        };
+
+        $arguments{$name} = $value;
+    }
+
+    return exists $arguments{optional} ? 'explicit-undef' : 'omitted';
+}
+
+sub false_if_result {
+    if ($_[0]) { 'taken' }
+}
+
+is(
+    false_if_result(0),
+    0,
+    'an untaken if without else returns its false condition value',
+);
+
+is(
+    false_if_result(1),
+    'taken',
+    'a taken if without else returns its branch value',
+);
+
+is(
+    validate_named_arguments(required => 'value'),
+    'omitted',
+    'omitted optional named arguments are not materialized as undef',
+);
+
+is(
+    validate_named_arguments(required => 'value', optional => undef),
+    'explicit-undef',
+    'explicit undef remains distinguishable from an omitted argument',
+);
+
+done_testing;