diff --git a/CHANGELOG.md b/CHANGELOG.md
index 64d43e80b4..6ba142dfeb 100644
--- a/CHANGELOG.md
+++ b/CHANGELOG.md
@@ -16,10 +16,13 @@ and this project adheres to
   `pbkdf2Sha512Crypto` was removed. Node.js has sufficient support for WebCrypto
   these days and we still have a pure-JS fallback implementation. This avoids
   unnecessary problems around importing Node.js modules. ([#1341])
+- @cosmjs/proto-signing: Make input and output of `decodePubkey` non-optional
+  ([#1289]).
 
 [#1002]: https://github.com/cosmos/cosmjs/issues/1002
 [#1341]: https://github.com/cosmos/cosmjs/issues/1341
 [#1240]: https://github.com/cosmos/cosmjs/pull/1240
+[#1289]: https://github.com/cosmos/cosmjs/issues/1289
 
 ## [0.29.5] - 2022-12-07
 
diff --git a/packages/proto-signing/src/pubkey.ts b/packages/proto-signing/src/pubkey.ts
index 8a07980d51..8fc935f9f2 100644
--- a/packages/proto-signing/src/pubkey.ts
+++ b/packages/proto-signing/src/pubkey.ts
@@ -57,8 +57,7 @@ export function encodePubkey(pubkey: Pubkey): Any {
  * Decodes a single pubkey (i.e. not a multisig pubkey) from `Any` into
  * `SinglePubkey`.
  *
- * In most cases you probably want to use `decodePubkey`, but `anyToSinglePubkey`
- * might be preferred in CosmJS 0.29.x due to https://github.com/cosmos/cosmjs/issues/1289.
+ * In most cases you probably want to use `decodePubkey`.
  */
 export function anyToSinglePubkey(pubkey: Any): SinglePubkey {
   switch (pubkey.typeUrl) {
@@ -75,11 +74,12 @@ export function anyToSinglePubkey(pubkey: Any): SinglePubkey {
   }
 }
 
-export function decodePubkey(pubkey?: Any | null): Pubkey | null {
-  if (!pubkey || !pubkey.value) {
-    return null;
-  }
-
+/**
+ * Decodes a pubkey from a protobuf `Any` into `Pubkey`.
+ * This supports single pubkeys such as Cosmos ed25519 and secp256k1 keys
+ * as well as multisig threshold pubkeys.
+ */
+export function decodePubkey(pubkey: Any): Pubkey {
   switch (pubkey.typeUrl) {
     case "/cosmos.crypto.secp256k1.PubKey":
     case "/cosmos.crypto.ed25519.PubKey": {
diff --git a/packages/stargate/src/accounts.ts b/packages/stargate/src/accounts.ts
index 8b5d74a1dd..77ca4f968b 100644
--- a/packages/stargate/src/accounts.ts
+++ b/packages/stargate/src/accounts.ts
@@ -26,7 +26,7 @@ function uint64FromProto(input: number | Long): Uint64 {
 
 function accountFromBaseAccount(input: BaseAccount): Account {
   const { address, pubKey, accountNumber, sequence } = input;
-  const pubkey = decodePubkey(pubKey);
+  const pubkey = pubKey ? decodePubkey(pubKey) : null;
   return {
     address: address,
     pubkey: pubkey,
diff --git a/packages/stargate/src/modules/staking/aminomessages.ts b/packages/stargate/src/modules/staking/aminomessages.ts
index 38f3131f80..6eb171f817 100644
--- a/packages/stargate/src/modules/staking/aminomessages.ts
+++ b/packages/stargate/src/modules/staking/aminomessages.ts
@@ -1,7 +1,7 @@
 /* eslint-disable @typescript-eslint/naming-convention */
 import { AminoMsg, Coin, Pubkey } from "@cosmjs/amino";
 import { Decimal } from "@cosmjs/math";
-import { anyToSinglePubkey, encodePubkey } from "@cosmjs/proto-signing";
+import { decodePubkey, encodePubkey } from "@cosmjs/proto-signing";
 import { assertDefinedAndNotNull } from "@cosmjs/utils";
 import {
   MsgBeginRedelegate,
@@ -206,7 +206,7 @@ export function createStakingAminoConverters(
           min_self_delegation: minSelfDelegation,
           delegator_address: delegatorAddress,
           validator_address: validatorAddress,
-          pubkey: anyToSinglePubkey(pubkey),
+          pubkey: decodePubkey(pubkey),
           value: value,
         };
       },