diff --git a/src/nvim/memory.c b/src/nvim/memory.c
index cd04abdbb9..b39c113f99 100644
--- a/src/nvim/memory.c
+++ b/src/nvim/memory.c
@@ -214,7 +214,7 @@ char *xstrndup(const char *str, size_t len)
   return xmemdupz(str, p ? (size_t)(p - str) : len);
 }
 
-char *xmemdup(const char *data, size_t len)
+void *xmemdup(const void *data, size_t len)
 {
   return memcpy(xmalloc(len), data, len);
 }
diff --git a/src/nvim/memory.h b/src/nvim/memory.h
index cd25aa9fd0..dc09e49073 100644
--- a/src/nvim/memory.h
+++ b/src/nvim/memory.h
@@ -133,7 +133,7 @@ char *xstpncpy(char *restrict dst, const char *restrict src, size_t maxlen);
 /// @param data pointer to the chunk
 /// @param len size of the chunk
 /// @return a pointer
-char *xmemdup(const char *data, size_t len)
+void *xmemdup(const void *data, size_t len)
  FUNC_ATTR_MALLOC FUNC_ATTR_WARN_UNUSED_RESULT FUNC_ATTR_NONNULL_RET;
 
 /// Old low level memory allocation function.