diff --git a/static/js/markdown.js b/static/js/markdown.js
index 1e210b924d..0b15e5e445 100644
--- a/static/js/markdown.js
+++ b/static/js/markdown.js
@@ -439,6 +439,9 @@ exports.initialize = function () {
     // Our links have title= and target=_blank
     r.link = function (href, title, text) {
         title = title || href;
+        if (!text.trim()) {
+            text = href;
+        }
         var out = '<a href="' + href + '"' + ' target="_blank" title="' +
                   title + '"' + '>' + text + '</a>';
         return out;
diff --git a/zerver/lib/bugdown/__init__.py b/zerver/lib/bugdown/__init__.py
index d4d851351d..40569f6723 100644
--- a/zerver/lib/bugdown/__init__.py
+++ b/zerver/lib/bugdown/__init__.py
@@ -1802,6 +1802,10 @@ class LinkInlineProcessor(markdown.inlinepatterns.LinkInlineProcessor):
         el.set("href", href)
         fixup_link(el, target_blank=(href[:1] != '#'))
 
+        # Show link href if title is empty
+        if not el.text.strip():
+            el.text = href
+
         # Prevent realm_filters from running on the content of a Markdown link, breaking up the link.
         # This is a monkey-patch, but it might be worth sending a version of this change upstream.
         if not isinstance(el, str):
diff --git a/zerver/tests/fixtures/markdown_test_cases.json b/zerver/tests/fixtures/markdown_test_cases.json
index bbe7032b3d..cc53eda7f2 100644
--- a/zerver/tests/fixtures/markdown_test_cases.json
+++ b/zerver/tests/fixtures/markdown_test_cases.json
@@ -373,6 +373,21 @@
       "input": "https://github.com",
       "expected_output": "<p><a href=\"https://github.com\" target=\"_blank\" title=\"https://github.com\">https://github.com</a></p>"
     },
+    {
+      "name": "link_with_text",
+      "input": "[hello](https://github.com)",
+      "expected_output": "<p><a href=\"https://github.com\" target=\"_blank\" title=\"https://github.com\">hello</a></p>"
+    },
+    {
+      "name": "link_without_text",
+      "input": "[](https://github.com)",
+      "expected_output": "<p><a href=\"https://github.com\" target=\"_blank\" title=\"https://github.com\">https://github.com</a></p>"
+    },
+    {
+      "name": "link_with_empty_text",
+      "input": "[  ](https://github.com)",
+      "expected_output": "<p><a href=\"https://github.com\" target=\"_blank\" title=\"https://github.com\">https://github.com</a></p>"
+    },
     {
       "name": "nl2br",
       "input": "test\nbar",