diff --git a/cpp/benchmarks/text/tokenize.cpp b/cpp/benchmarks/text/tokenize.cpp
index 2151b28d637..e83310e0343 100644
--- a/cpp/benchmarks/text/tokenize.cpp
+++ b/cpp/benchmarks/text/tokenize.cpp
@@ -39,8 +39,10 @@ static void bench_tokenize(nvbench::state& state)
     state.skip("Skip benchmarks greater than size_type limit");
   }
 
-  data_profile const profile = data_profile_builder().distribution(
-    cudf::type_id::STRING, distribution_id::NORMAL, 0, row_width);
+  data_profile const profile =
+    data_profile_builder()
+      .distribution(cudf::type_id::STRING, distribution_id::NORMAL, 0, row_width)
+      .no_validity();
   auto const column = create_random_column(cudf::type_id::STRING, row_count{num_rows}, profile);
   cudf::strings_column_view input(column->view());
 
diff --git a/cpp/include/nvtext/tokenize.hpp b/cpp/include/nvtext/tokenize.hpp
index ea1b9c716f0..29fed0759c7 100644
--- a/cpp/include/nvtext/tokenize.hpp
+++ b/cpp/include/nvtext/tokenize.hpp
@@ -176,7 +176,8 @@ std::unique_ptr<cudf::column> count_tokens(
  * t is now ["h","e","l","l","o"," ","w","o","r","l","d","g","o","o","d","b","y","e"]
  * @endcode
  *
- * All null row entries are ignored and the output contains all valid rows.
+ * @throw std::invalid_argument if `input` contains nulls
+ * @throw std::overflow_error if the output would produce more than max size_type rows
  *
  * @param input Strings column to tokenize
  * @param stream CUDA stream used for device memory operations and kernel launches
diff --git a/cpp/src/text/tokenize.cu b/cpp/src/text/tokenize.cu
index 0b16305a81a..25406bce759 100644
--- a/cpp/src/text/tokenize.cu
+++ b/cpp/src/text/tokenize.cu
@@ -21,6 +21,7 @@
 #include <cudf/column/column_factories.hpp>
 #include <cudf/detail/nvtx/ranges.hpp>
 #include <cudf/detail/utilities/algorithm.cuh>
+#include <cudf/detail/utilities/integer_utils.hpp>
 #include <cudf/strings/detail/strings_column_factories.cuh>
 #include <cudf/strings/string_view.cuh>
 #include <cudf/strings/strings_column_view.hpp>
@@ -35,6 +36,7 @@
 #include <rmm/exec_policy.hpp>
 #include <rmm/resource_ref.hpp>
 
+#include <cuda/atomic>
 #include <thrust/copy.h>
 #include <thrust/count.h>
 #include <thrust/for_each.h>
@@ -99,6 +101,31 @@ std::unique_ptr<cudf::column> tokenize_fn(cudf::size_type strings_count,
   return cudf::strings::detail::make_strings_column(tokens.begin(), tokens.end(), stream, mr);
 }
 
+constexpr int64_t block_size       = 512;  // number of threads per block
+constexpr int64_t bytes_per_thread = 4;    // bytes processed per thread
+
+CUDF_KERNEL void count_characters(uint8_t const* d_chars, int64_t chars_bytes, int64_t* d_output)
+{
+  auto const idx      = cudf::detail::grid_1d::global_thread_id();
+  auto const byte_idx = static_cast<int64_t>(idx) * bytes_per_thread;
+  auto const lane_idx = static_cast<cudf::size_type>(threadIdx.x);
+
+  using block_reduce = cub::BlockReduce<int64_t, block_size>;
+  __shared__ typename block_reduce::TempStorage temp_storage;
+
+  int64_t count = 0;
+  // each thread processes multiple bytes
+  for (auto i = byte_idx; (i < (byte_idx + bytes_per_thread)) && (i < chars_bytes); ++i) {
+    count += cudf::strings::detail::is_begin_utf8_char(d_chars[i]);
+  }
+  auto const total = block_reduce(temp_storage).Reduce(count, cub::Sum());
+
+  if ((lane_idx == 0) && (total > 0)) {
+    cuda::atomic_ref<int64_t, cuda::thread_scope_block> ref{*d_output};
+    ref.fetch_add(total, cuda::std::memory_order_relaxed);
+  }
+}
+
 }  // namespace
 
 // detail APIs
@@ -176,11 +203,17 @@ std::unique_ptr<cudf::column> character_tokenize(cudf::strings_column_view const
     return cudf::make_empty_column(cudf::data_type{cudf::type_id::STRING});
   }
 
-  auto offsets = strings_column.offsets();
-  auto offset  = cudf::strings::detail::get_offset_value(offsets, strings_column.offset(), stream);
-  auto chars_bytes = cudf::strings::detail::get_offset_value(
-                       offsets, strings_column.offset() + strings_count, stream) -
-                     offset;
+  CUDF_EXPECTS(
+    strings_column.null_count() == 0, "input must not contain nulls", std::invalid_argument);
+
+  auto const offsets = strings_column.offsets();
+  auto const offset =
+    cudf::strings::detail::get_offset_value(offsets, strings_column.offset(), stream);
+  auto const chars_bytes = cudf::strings::detail::get_offset_value(
+                             offsets, strings_column.offset() + strings_count, stream) -
+                           offset;
+  // no bytes -- this could happen in an all-empty column
+  if (chars_bytes == 0) { return cudf::make_empty_column(cudf::type_id::STRING); }
   auto d_chars =
     strings_column.parent().data<uint8_t>();  // unsigned is necessary for checking bits
   d_chars += offset;
@@ -188,23 +221,26 @@ std::unique_ptr<cudf::column> character_tokenize(cudf::strings_column_view const
   // To minimize memory, count the number of characters so we can
   // build the output offsets without an intermediate buffer.
   // In the worst case each byte is a character so the output is 4x the input.
-  cudf::size_type num_characters = thrust::count_if(
-    rmm::exec_policy(stream), d_chars, d_chars + chars_bytes, [] __device__(uint8_t byte) {
-      return cudf::strings::detail::is_begin_utf8_char(byte);
-    });
+  rmm::device_scalar<int64_t> d_count(0, stream);
+  auto const num_blocks = cudf::util::div_rounding_up_safe(
+    cudf::util::div_rounding_up_safe(chars_bytes, static_cast<int64_t>(bytes_per_thread)),
+    block_size);
+  count_characters<<<num_blocks, block_size, 0, stream.value()>>>(
+    d_chars, chars_bytes, d_count.data());
+  auto const num_characters = d_count.value(stream);
 
-  // no characters check -- this could happen in all-empty or all-null strings column
-  if (num_characters == 0) {
-    return cudf::make_empty_column(cudf::data_type{cudf::type_id::STRING});
-  }
+  // number of characters becomes the number of rows so need to check the row limit
+  CUDF_EXPECTS(
+    num_characters + 1 < static_cast<int64_t>(std::numeric_limits<cudf::size_type>::max()),
+    "output exceeds the column size limit",
+    std::overflow_error);
 
   // create output offsets column
-  // -- conditionally copy a counting iterator where
-  //    the first byte of each character is located
   auto offsets_column = cudf::make_numeric_column(
     offsets.type(), num_characters + 1, cudf::mask_state::UNALLOCATED, stream, mr);
   auto d_new_offsets =
     cudf::detail::offsetalator_factory::make_output_iterator(offsets_column->mutable_view());
+  // offsets are at the beginning byte of each character
   cudf::detail::copy_if_safe(
     thrust::counting_iterator<int64_t>(0),
     thrust::counting_iterator<int64_t>(chars_bytes + 1),
diff --git a/cpp/tests/text/tokenize_tests.cpp b/cpp/tests/text/tokenize_tests.cpp
index 6a6bcda87cc..a59a54169d7 100644
--- a/cpp/tests/text/tokenize_tests.cpp
+++ b/cpp/tests/text/tokenize_tests.cpp
@@ -111,17 +111,13 @@ TEST_F(TextTokenizeTest, TokenizeErrorTest)
 
 TEST_F(TextTokenizeTest, CharacterTokenize)
 {
-  std::vector<char const*> h_strings{"the mousé ate the cheese", nullptr, ""};
-  cudf::test::strings_column_wrapper strings(
-    h_strings.begin(),
-    h_strings.end(),
-    thrust::make_transform_iterator(h_strings.begin(), [](auto str) { return str != nullptr; }));
+  cudf::test::strings_column_wrapper input({"the mousé ate the cheese", ""});
 
   cudf::test::strings_column_wrapper expected{"t", "h", "e", " ", "m", "o", "u", "s",
                                               "é", " ", "a", "t", "e", " ", "t", "h",
                                               "e", " ", "c", "h", "e", "e", "s", "e"};
 
-  auto results = nvtext::character_tokenize(cudf::strings_column_view(strings));
+  auto results = nvtext::character_tokenize(cudf::strings_column_view(input));
   CUDF_TEST_EXPECT_COLUMNS_EQUAL(*results, expected);
 }
 
@@ -151,8 +147,6 @@ TEST_F(TextTokenizeTest, TokenizeEmptyTest)
   EXPECT_EQ(results->size(), 0);
   results = nvtext::character_tokenize(all_empty);
   EXPECT_EQ(results->size(), 0);
-  results = nvtext::character_tokenize(all_null);
-  EXPECT_EQ(results->size(), 0);
   auto const delimiter = cudf::string_scalar{""};
   results              = nvtext::tokenize_with_vocabulary(view, all_empty, delimiter);
   EXPECT_EQ(results->size(), 0);
diff --git a/python/cudf/cudf/core/column/string.py b/python/cudf/cudf/core/column/string.py
index d12aa80e9a3..ad7dbe5e52e 100644
--- a/python/cudf/cudf/core/column/string.py
+++ b/python/cudf/cudf/core/column/string.py
@@ -552,16 +552,17 @@ def join(
         return self._return_or_inplace(data)
 
     def _split_by_character(self):
-        result_col = libstrings.character_tokenize(self._column)
+        col = self._column.fillna("")  # sanitize nulls
+        result_col = libstrings.character_tokenize(col)
 
-        offset_col = self._column.children[0]
+        offset_col = col.children[0]
 
         return cudf.core.column.ListColumn(
-            size=len(self._column),
-            dtype=cudf.ListDtype(self._column.dtype),
-            mask=self._column.mask,
+            size=len(col),
+            dtype=cudf.ListDtype(col.dtype),
+            mask=col.mask,
             offset=0,
-            null_count=self._column.null_count,
+            null_count=0,
             children=(offset_col, result_col),
         )
 
diff --git a/python/cudf/cudf/tests/text/test_text_methods.py b/python/cudf/cudf/tests/text/test_text_methods.py
index 6bd3b99bae1..36f7f3de828 100644
--- a/python/cudf/cudf/tests/text/test_text_methods.py
+++ b/python/cudf/cudf/tests/text/test_text_methods.py
@@ -426,7 +426,6 @@ def test_character_tokenize_series():
         [
             "hello world",
             "sdf",
-            None,
             (
                 "goodbye, one-two:three~four+five_six@sev"
                 "en#eight^nine heŒŽ‘•™œ$µ¾ŤƠé DŽ"
@@ -543,7 +542,6 @@ def test_character_tokenize_index():
         [
             "hello world",
             "sdf",
-            None,
             (
                 "goodbye, one-two:three~four+five_six@sev"
                 "en#eight^nine heŒŽ‘•™œ$µ¾ŤƠé DŽ"