diff --git a/src/render/software.zig b/src/render/software.zig
index 1872142..6215fc6 100644
--- a/src/render/software.zig
+++ b/src/render/software.zig
@@ -102,19 +102,70 @@ pub const SoftwareRenderer = struct {
 
         const clip = self.getClip();
 
-        // Simple text rendering - character by character
+        // UTF-8 text rendering - decode codepoints properly
         var x = t.x;
-        for (t.text) |char| {
-            if (char == '\n') {
-                // TODO: Handle newlines
-                continue;
-            }
-
+        var i: usize = 0;
+        while (i < t.text.len) {
             // Check if character is visible
             if (x >= clip.right()) break;
 
+            // Decode UTF-8 codepoint
+            const byte = t.text[i];
+            var codepoint: u21 = undefined;
+            var bytes_consumed: usize = 1;
+
+            if (byte < 0x80) {
+                // ASCII (0x00-0x7F)
+                codepoint = byte;
+            } else if (byte < 0xC0) {
+                // Invalid start byte (continuation byte), skip
+                i += 1;
+                continue;
+            } else if (byte < 0xE0) {
+                // 2-byte sequence (0xC0-0xDF)
+                if (i + 1 < t.text.len) {
+                    codepoint = (@as(u21, byte & 0x1F) << 6) |
+                        @as(u21, t.text[i + 1] & 0x3F);
+                    bytes_consumed = 2;
+                } else {
+                    i += 1;
+                    continue;
+                }
+            } else if (byte < 0xF0) {
+                // 3-byte sequence (0xE0-0xEF)
+                if (i + 2 < t.text.len) {
+                    codepoint = (@as(u21, byte & 0x0F) << 12) |
+                        (@as(u21, t.text[i + 1] & 0x3F) << 6) |
+                        @as(u21, t.text[i + 2] & 0x3F);
+                    bytes_consumed = 3;
+                } else {
+                    i += 1;
+                    continue;
+                }
+            } else {
+                // 4-byte sequence (0xF0-0xF7) - beyond Latin-1, skip
+                bytes_consumed = 4;
+                i += bytes_consumed;
+                x += @as(i32, @intCast(font.charWidth())); // placeholder space
+                continue;
+            }
+
+            i += bytes_consumed;
+
+            // Handle newlines
+            if (codepoint == '\n') {
+                continue;
+            }
+
+            // Convert codepoint to Latin-1 for rendering
+            // Latin-1 covers 0x00-0xFF directly
+            const char_to_render: u8 = if (codepoint <= 0xFF)
+                @intCast(codepoint)
+            else
+                '?'; // Replacement for chars outside Latin-1
+
             // Render character
-            font.drawChar(self.framebuffer, x, t.y, char, t.color, clip);
+            font.drawChar(self.framebuffer, x, t.y, char_to_render, t.color, clip);
 
             x += @as(i32, @intCast(font.charWidth()));
         }