diff --git a/deb/reflist.go b/deb/reflist.go
index 8a795da5..25cb0b6e 100644
--- a/deb/reflist.go
+++ b/deb/reflist.go
@@ -71,7 +71,9 @@ func (l *PackageRefList) Encode() []byte {
 
 // Decode decodes msgpack representation into PackageRefLit
 func (l *PackageRefList) Decode(input []byte) error {
-	decoder := codec.NewDecoderBytes(input, &codec.MsgpackHandle{})
+	handle := &codec.MsgpackHandle{}
+	handle.ZeroCopy = true
+	decoder := codec.NewDecoderBytes(input, handle)
 	return decoder.Decode(l)
 }
 
diff --git a/deb/reflist_bench_test.go b/deb/reflist_bench_test.go
index 367f3d09..b377574c 100644
--- a/deb/reflist_bench_test.go
+++ b/deb/reflist_bench_test.go
@@ -28,3 +28,20 @@ func BenchmarkReflistSimpleMerge(b *testing.B) {
 		l.Merge(r, false, true)
 	}
 }
+
+func BenchmarkReflistDecode(b *testing.B) {
+	const count = 4096
+
+	r := NewPackageRefList()
+	for i := 0; i < count; i++ {
+		r.Refs = append(r.Refs, []byte(fmt.Sprintf("Pamd64 pkg%d %d", i, i)))
+	}
+
+	sort.Sort(r)
+	data := r.Encode()
+
+	b.ResetTimer()
+	for i := 0; i < b.N; i++ {
+		(&PackageRefList{}).Decode(data)
+	}
+}