diff --git a/releasenotes.md b/releasenotes.md
index 2fdb8c2b8..26ba1843b 100644
--- a/releasenotes.md
+++ b/releasenotes.md
@@ -15,6 +15,7 @@
 - Crash when reading an empty 'manifest.json'.
 - "optsize" did not work correctly in project.json.
 - `l[0].a = 1` now supported for overloads due to better lvalue handling #1357.
+- Asserts are retained regardless of optimization when running tests.
 
 ### Stdlib changes
 - Additional init functions for hashmap.
diff --git a/src/compiler/llvm_codegen_stmt.c b/src/compiler/llvm_codegen_stmt.c
index 78fad4aab..1f6f6f072 100644
--- a/src/compiler/llvm_codegen_stmt.c
+++ b/src/compiler/llvm_codegen_stmt.c
@@ -1176,7 +1176,7 @@ static inline void llvm_emit_assert_stmt(GenContext *c, Ast *ast)
 {
 	ExprId exprid = ast->assert_stmt.expr;
 	Expr *assert_expr = exprptr(exprid);
-	if (safe_mode_enabled())
+	if (safe_mode_enabled() || compiler.build.testing)
 	{
 		BEValue value;
 		llvm_emit_expr(c, &value, assert_expr);