diff --git a/lib/path.js b/lib/path.js
index e0c5bcaa1c1050..78c61579ec0fc8 100644
--- a/lib/path.js
+++ b/lib/path.js
@@ -76,7 +76,7 @@ function win32SplitPath(filename) {
   // Separate device+slash from tail
   var result = splitDeviceRe.exec(filename),
       device = (result[1] || '') + (result[2] || ''),
-      tail = result[3] || '';
+      tail = result[3];
   // Split the tail into dir, basename and extension
   var result2 = splitTailRe.exec(tail),
       dir = result2[1],
@@ -386,9 +386,6 @@ win32.parse = function(pathString) {
   assertPath(pathString);
 
   var allParts = win32SplitPath(pathString);
-  if (!allParts || allParts.length !== 4) {
-    throw new TypeError("Invalid path '" + pathString + "'");
-  }
   return {
     root: allParts[0],
     dir: allParts[0] + allParts[1].slice(0, -1),
@@ -590,13 +587,6 @@ posix.parse = function(pathString) {
   assertPath(pathString);
 
   var allParts = posixSplitPath(pathString);
-  if (!allParts || allParts.length !== 4) {
-    throw new TypeError("Invalid path '" + pathString + "'");
-  }
-  allParts[1] = allParts[1] || '';
-  allParts[2] = allParts[2] || '';
-  allParts[3] = allParts[3] || '';
-
   return {
     root: allParts[0],
     dir: allParts[0] + allParts[1].slice(0, -1),
diff --git a/test/parallel/test-path-parse-format.js b/test/parallel/test-path-parse-format.js
index 677bf3241f0bae..e90fe217de93ec 100644
--- a/test/parallel/test-path-parse-format.js
+++ b/test/parallel/test-path-parse-format.js
@@ -9,6 +9,7 @@ var winPaths = [
   '\\foo\\C:',
   'file',
   '.\\file',
+  '',
 
   // unc
   '\\\\server\\share\\file_path',
@@ -32,7 +33,8 @@ var unixPaths = [
   'file',
   '.\\file',
   './file',
-  'C:\\foo'
+  'C:\\foo',
+  ''
 ];
 
 var unixSpecialCaseFormatTests = [
@@ -52,8 +54,6 @@ var errors = [
    message: /Path must be a string. Received 1/},
   {method: 'parse', input: [],
    message: /Path must be a string. Received undefined/},
-  // {method: 'parse', input: [''],
-  //  message: /Invalid path/}, // omitted because it's hard to trigger!
   {method: 'format', input: [null],
    message: /Parameter 'pathObject' must be an object, not/},
   {method: 'format', input: [''],
@@ -93,8 +93,13 @@ function checkErrors(path) {
 }
 
 function checkParseFormat(path, paths) {
-  paths.forEach(function(element, index, array) {
+  paths.forEach(function(element) {
     var output = path.parse(element);
+    assert.strictEqual(typeof output.root, 'string');
+    assert.strictEqual(typeof output.dir, 'string');
+    assert.strictEqual(typeof output.base, 'string');
+    assert.strictEqual(typeof output.ext, 'string');
+    assert.strictEqual(typeof output.name, 'string');
     assert.strictEqual(path.format(output), element);
     assert.strictEqual(output.dir, output.dir ? path.dirname(element) : '');
     assert.strictEqual(output.base, path.basename(element));