diff --git a/src/gitingest/schemas/filesystem.py b/src/gitingest/schemas/filesystem.py
index b5669f18..a62e0887 100644
--- a/src/gitingest/schemas/filesystem.py
+++ b/src/gitingest/schemas/filesystem.py
@@ -142,7 +142,7 @@ def content(self) -> str:  # pylint: disable=too-many-return-statements
         if chunk == b"":
             return "[Empty file]"
 
-        if not _decodes(chunk, "utf-8"):
+        if is_binary_file(chunk):
             return "[Binary file]"
 
         # Find the first encoding that decodes the sample
@@ -159,3 +159,15 @@ def content(self) -> str:  # pylint: disable=too-many-return-statements
                 return fp.read()
         except (OSError, UnicodeDecodeError) as exc:
             return f"Error reading file with {good_enc!r}: {exc}"
+
+
+def is_binary_file(file_contents: bytes | None) -> bool:
+    """Check whether a file is binary by reading its first 1024 bytes and looking for non-text characters."""
+    if not file_contents:
+        return False  # Empty files are not binary
+
+    text_characters = bytes(
+        {7, 8, 9, 10, 12, 13, 27}.union(set(range(0x20, 0x100)) - {0x7F}),
+    )
+    # If translate returns any bytes, those are non-text (binary) bytes
+    return bool(file_contents.translate(None, text_characters))
diff --git a/src/gitingest/utils/file_utils.py b/src/gitingest/utils/file_utils.py
index 2c6ef74d..a1b9a0e2 100644
--- a/src/gitingest/utils/file_utils.py
+++ b/src/gitingest/utils/file_utils.py
@@ -27,9 +27,11 @@ def _get_preferred_encodings() -> list[str]:
         platform's default encoding followed by common fallback encodings.
 
     """
-    encodings = [locale.getpreferredencoding(), "utf-8", "utf-16", "utf-16le", "utf-8-sig", "latin"]
+    encodings = [locale.getpreferredencoding(), "utf-8", "utf-16le", "utf-8-sig", "latin"]
     if platform.system() == "Windows":
-        encodings += ["cp1252", "iso-8859-1"]
+        encodings += ["utf-16be", "cp1252", "iso-8859-1"]
+    else:
+        encodings += ["utf-16"]
     return list(dict.fromkeys(encodings))