diff --git a/CHANGELOG.md b/CHANGELOG.md
index fd35541b..54d89f15 100644
--- a/CHANGELOG.md
+++ b/CHANGELOG.md
@@ -6,6 +6,7 @@
 
 #### Fixes
 
+* [#986](https://github.com/ruby-grape/grape-swagger/pull/986): Read a route's tags through `route.tags` instead of `route.options`; a blank `tags:` (`nil` or `[]`) now means "not specified" and derives the tag from the path. See [UPGRADING](UPGRADING.md) - [@ericproulx](https://github.com/ericproulx).
 * Your contribution here.
 
 ### 2.2.0 (2026-08-06)
diff --git a/README.md b/README.md
index 1766ffff..a6a85275 100644
--- a/README.md
+++ b/README.md
@@ -648,6 +648,8 @@ end
 Tags are used for logical grouping of operations by resources or any other qualifier. To override the
 tags array, add `tags: ['tag1', 'tag2']` after the description.
 
+When `tags:` is not given, or is `nil` or empty, the tag is derived from the path.
+
 ```ruby
 namespace 'order' do
   desc 'This will be your summary', tags: ['orders']
diff --git a/UPGRADING.md b/UPGRADING.md
index 0fd5d24f..f8fb7dbd 100644
--- a/UPGRADING.md
+++ b/UPGRADING.md
@@ -1,5 +1,11 @@
 ## Upgrading Grape-swagger
 
+### Upgrading to >= 2.3.0
+
+- **A blank `desc(..., tags:)` now means "not specified".** `tags: nil` no longer suppresses the tag and `tags: []` no longer emits an empty `"tags": []`; both derive the tag from the path, as if `tags:` had been omitted. `tags:` is an override, and only a non-empty list overrides anything.
+
+  The old `nil` behaviour was never a deliberate one: [#523](https://github.com/ruby-grape/grape-swagger/pull/523) introduced route-level tags to *override* path-derived grouping and read them with `route.options.fetch(:tags, tag_object(route))`, whose default-on-absence semantics happened to give `nil` a meaning of its own. It was never documented or tested.
+
 ### Upgrading to >= 2.2.0
 
 - **Minimum Grape version is now `>= 2.1`** (was `>= 1.7`). Grape 1.8.0 and 2.0.0 cannot be used on Ruby 3.3+ because of an upstream Mustermann/forwardable incompatibility; the CI rows for those combinations were already failing on `master` and have been removed.
diff --git a/lib/grape-swagger/endpoint.rb b/lib/grape-swagger/endpoint.rb
index 70a8a8ea..fba5fb40 100644
--- a/lib/grape-swagger/endpoint.rb
+++ b/lib/grape-swagger/endpoint.rb
@@ -123,7 +123,7 @@ def method_object(route, options, path)
       method[:parameters]  = params_object(route, options, path, method[:consumes])
       method[:security]    = security_object(route)
       method[:responses]   = response_object(route, options)
-      method[:tags]        = route.options.key?(:tags) ? route.tags : tag_object(route, path)
+      method[:tags]        = route.tags.presence || tag_object(route, path)
       method[:operationId] = GrapeSwagger::DocMethods::OperationId.build(route, path)
       method[:deprecated] = deprecated_object(route)
       method.delete_if { |_, value| value.nil? }
diff --git a/spec/swagger_v2/endpoint_versioned_path_spec.rb b/spec/swagger_v2/endpoint_versioned_path_spec.rb
index d6cc2f1b..65766f08 100644
--- a/spec/swagger_v2/endpoint_versioned_path_spec.rb
+++ b/spec/swagger_v2/endpoint_versioned_path_spec.rb
@@ -65,8 +65,25 @@
         end
       end
 
-      it 'omits the tags key instead of falling back to the default tag' do
-        expect(subject.first['/v1/item'][:get]).not_to have_key(:tags)
+      it 'falls back to the default tag' do
+        expect(subject.first['/v1/item'][:get][:tags]).to eq ['item']
+      end
+    end
+
+    context 'when tags are explicitly empty' do
+      let(:item) do
+        Class.new(Grape::API) do
+          version 'v1', using: :path
+
+          resource :item do
+            desc 'Item description', tags: []
+            get '/'
+          end
+        end
+      end
+
+      it 'falls back to the default tag' do
+        expect(subject.first['/v1/item'][:get][:tags]).to eq ['item']
       end
     end