diff --git a/driver/netconf/driver.go b/driver/netconf/driver.go
index 14f61b8..176e392 100644
--- a/driver/netconf/driver.go
+++ b/driver/netconf/driver.go
@@ -48,7 +48,10 @@ const (
 
 	subscriptionResultPattern = `(?i)<subscription-result.*>notif-bis:(.+)</subscription-result>`
 
-	emptyTagPattern = `<(\w+)></\w+>`
+	// emptyTagPattern matches netconf empty tags to allow
+	// forcing of self-closing tags.
+	// See https://regex101.com/r/rmsS2E/3.
+	emptyTagPattern = `<([^>/]+?)(\s+[^>]+?)?>\s*</[\w-]+>`
 
 	defaultNamespace = "urn:ietf:params:xml:ns:yang:ietf-netconf-with-defaults"
 
diff --git a/driver/netconf/rpc.go b/driver/netconf/rpc.go
index e0fef07..0cf0e0d 100644
--- a/driver/netconf/rpc.go
+++ b/driver/netconf/rpc.go
@@ -26,24 +26,17 @@ func (d *Driver) RPC(opts ...util.Option) (*response.NetconfResponse, error) {
 	return d.sendRPC(d.buildRPCElem(op.Filter), op)
 }
 
-func forceSelfClosingTags(b []byte) []byte {
+// ForceSelfClosingTags accepts a netconf looking xml byte slice and forces any "empty" tags (tags
+// without attributes) to use self-closing tags. For example:
+// `<running> </running>`
+// Would be converted to:
+// `<running/>`.
+func ForceSelfClosingTags(b []byte) []byte {
 	ncPatterns := getNetconfPatterns()
 
-	emptyTagIdxs := ncPatterns.emptyTags.FindAllSubmatchIndex(b, -1)
+	r := ncPatterns.emptyTags.ReplaceAll(b, []byte("<$1$2/>"))
 
-	var nb []byte
-
-	for _, idx := range emptyTagIdxs {
-		// get everything in b up till the first of the submatch indexes (this is the start of an
-		// "empty" <thing></thing> tag), then get the name of the tag and put it in a self-closing
-		// tag.
-		nb = append(b[0:idx[0]], fmt.Sprintf("<%s/>", b[idx[2]:idx[3]])...) //nolint: gocritic
-
-		// finally, append everything *after* the submatch indexes
-		nb = append(nb, b[len(b)-(len(b)-idx[1]):]...)
-	}
-
-	return nb
+	return r
 }
 
 func (d *Driver) sendRPC(
@@ -58,7 +51,7 @@ func (d *Driver) sendRPC(
 	if d.ForceSelfClosingTags {
 		d.Logger.Debug("ForceSelfClosingTags is true, enforcing...")
 
-		b = forceSelfClosingTags(b)
+		b = ForceSelfClosingTags(b)
 	}
 
 	d.Logger.Debugf("sending finalized rpc payload:\n%s", string(b))
diff --git a/driver/netconf/rpc_test.go b/driver/netconf/rpc_test.go
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..64df694
--- /dev/null
+++ b/driver/netconf/rpc_test.go
@@ -0,0 +1,57 @@
+package netconf_test
+
+import (
+	"testing"
+
+	"github.com/scrapli/scrapligo/driver/netconf"
+
+	"github.com/google/go-cmp/cmp"
+)
+
+func TestForceSelfClosingTags(t *testing.T) {
+	tests := map[string]struct {
+		got  []byte
+		want []byte
+	}{
+		"empty_tag_no_attrs": {
+			got: []byte(
+				`<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?><rpc xmlns="urn:ietf:params:xml:ns:netconf:base:1.0" message-id="101"><get-config><source><running></running></source></get-config></rpc>]]>]]>`, //nolint: lll
+			),
+			want: []byte(
+				`<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?><rpc xmlns="urn:ietf:params:xml:ns:netconf:base:1.0" message-id="101"><get-config><source><running/></source></get-config></rpc>]]>]]>`, //nolint: lll
+			),
+		},
+		"empty_tag_with_attrs": {
+			got: []byte(
+				`<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?><rpc xmlns="urn:ietf:params:xml:ns:netconf:base:1.0" message-id="101"><get><filter type="subtree"><routing-policy xmlns="http://openconfig.net/yang/routing-policy"></routing-policy></filter></get></rpc>]]>]]>`, //nolint: lll
+			),
+			want: []byte(
+				`<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?><rpc xmlns="urn:ietf:params:xml:ns:netconf:base:1.0" message-id="101"><get><filter type="subtree"><routing-policy xmlns="http://openconfig.net/yang/routing-policy"/></filter></get></rpc>]]>]]>`, //nolint: lll
+			),
+		},
+		"empty_tag_with_attrs_and_spaces": {
+			got: []byte(
+				`<routing-policy xmlns="http://openconfig.net/yang/routing-policy">    </routing-policy>`,
+			),
+			want: []byte(`<routing-policy xmlns="http://openconfig.net/yang/routing-policy"/>`),
+		},
+		"empty_tag_no_attrs_and_spaces": {
+			got:  []byte(`<running>  </running>`),
+			want: []byte(`<running/>`),
+		},
+	}
+
+	for name, tt := range tests {
+		t.Run(name, func(t *testing.T) {
+			got := netconf.ForceSelfClosingTags(tt.got)
+			if !cmp.Equal(got, tt.want) {
+				t.Fatalf(
+					"%s: actual and expected values do not match\nactual: %s\nexpected:%s",
+					name,
+					got,
+					tt.want,
+				)
+			}
+		})
+	}
+}