diff --git a/x/compute/client/cli/tx.go b/x/compute/client/cli/tx.go
index 606cc6c07..96238e342 100644
--- a/x/compute/client/cli/tx.go
+++ b/x/compute/client/cli/tx.go
@@ -384,6 +384,11 @@ func GetCodeHashByCodeId(cliCtx client.Context, codeID string) ([]byte, error) {
 		return nil, err
 	}
 
+	// When querying for an unknown code id the output is an empty result (without any error)
+	if len(res) == 0 {
+		return nil, fmt.Errorf("failed to query contract code hash, unknown code id (%s)", codeID)
+	}
+
 	var codeResp types.QueryCodeResponse
 
 	err = json.Unmarshal(res, &codeResp)