diff --git a/NAMESPACE b/NAMESPACE
index 5373150e1..f822a3885 100644
--- a/NAMESPACE
+++ b/NAMESPACE
@@ -113,6 +113,7 @@ import(lifecycle)
 import(rlang)
 importFrom(fansi,strip_sgr)
 importFrom(fansi,substr_ctl)
+importFrom(utf8,utf8_format)
 importFrom(utf8,utf8_width)
 importFrom(utils,head)
 importFrom(utils,str)
diff --git a/R/extent.R b/R/extent.R
index 992fca4cd..c4e2e3ddb 100644
--- a/R/extent.R
+++ b/R/extent.R
@@ -6,7 +6,7 @@
 #' @param x A character vector.
 #' @export
 #' @importFrom fansi strip_sgr
-#' @importFrom utf8 utf8_width
+#' @importFrom utf8 utf8_width utf8_format
 #' @examples
 #' get_extent(c("abc", "de"))
 #' get_extent("\u904b\u6c23")
@@ -48,14 +48,7 @@ align <- function(x, width = NULL, align = c("left", "right")) {
   "!!!!!DEBUG align(`v(x)`, `v(class(x))`)"
 
   align <- match.arg(align)
-  extent <- get_extent(x)
-  if (is.null(width)) {
-    width <- max(extent)
-  }
-  spaces <- pmax(width - extent, 0L)
-  if (align == "left") {
-    paste0(x, strrep(" ", spaces))
-  } else {
-    paste0(strrep(" ", spaces), x)
-  }
+  attributes(x) <- NULL
+
+  utf8_format(x, justify = align, width = width)
 }
diff --git a/R/sigfig.R b/R/sigfig.R
index b19844550..085fc9adb 100644
--- a/R/sigfig.R
+++ b/R/sigfig.R
@@ -294,6 +294,6 @@ format.pillar_shaft_decimal <- function(x, width, ...) {
   }
 
   used_width <- get_max_extent(row)
-  row <- paste0(strrep(" ", width - used_width), row)
+  row <- paste0(strrep(" ", pmax(width - used_width, 0)), row)
   new_ornament(row, width = width, align = "right")
 }