diff --git a/src/plugins/type/README.md b/src/plugins/type/README.md
index 793b842cd28..6f91009907a 100644
--- a/src/plugins/type/README.md
+++ b/src/plugins/type/README.md
@@ -20,7 +20,7 @@ The type checker plugin supports these types:
 `any`, `enum`, `string`, `wstring` and `octet`.
 
 - Checking `any` will always be successful, regardless of the content.
-- `string` matches any non-empty key value.
+- `string` matches any string key value.
 - `octet` and `char` are equivalent to each other.
 - `enum` will do enum checking as described below.
 - `boolean` only allows the values `1` and `0`. See also [Normalization](#normalization).
diff --git a/src/plugins/type/types.c b/src/plugins/type/types.c
index f253a38f804..82e7961a2cc 100644
--- a/src/plugins/type/types.c
+++ b/src/plugins/type/types.c
@@ -58,7 +58,7 @@ bool elektraTypeCheckWChar (const Key * key)
 
 bool elektraTypeCheckString (const Key * key)
 {
-	return strlen (keyString (key)) != 0;
+	return keyIsString (key) == 1;
 }
 
 bool elektraTypeCheckWString (const Key * key)