diff --git a/docs/src/content/docs/api-input.md b/docs/src/content/docs/api-input.md
index 3e1f9a7d..e460723c 100644
--- a/docs/src/content/docs/api-input.md
+++ b/docs/src/content/docs/api-input.md
@@ -46,6 +46,7 @@ A `Promise` is returned when `callback` is not provided.
 - `icc`: Buffer containing raw [ICC](https://www.npmjs.com/package/icc) profile data, if present
 - `iptc`: Buffer containing raw IPTC data, if present
 - `xmp`: Buffer containing raw XMP data, if present
+- `xmpAsString`: String containing XMP data, if valid UTF-8.
 - `tifftagPhotoshop`: Buffer containing raw TIFFTAG_PHOTOSHOP data, if present
 - `formatMagick`: String containing format for images loaded via *magick
 - `comments`: Array of keyword/text pairs representing PNG text blocks, if present.
diff --git a/npm/darwin-arm64/package.json b/npm/darwin-arm64/package.json
index c1eb3bcd..d3799a8b 100644
--- a/npm/darwin-arm64/package.json
+++ b/npm/darwin-arm64/package.json
@@ -1,6 +1,6 @@
 {
   "name": "@img/sharp-darwin-arm64",
-  "version": "0.34.3-rc.0",
+  "version": "0.34.3-rc.1",
   "description": "Prebuilt sharp for use with macOS 64-bit ARM",
   "author": "Lovell Fuller <npm@lovell.info>",
   "homepage": "https://sharp.pixelplumbing.com",
diff --git a/npm/darwin-x64/package.json b/npm/darwin-x64/package.json
index 4f9778ae..560946b1 100644
--- a/npm/darwin-x64/package.json
+++ b/npm/darwin-x64/package.json
@@ -1,6 +1,6 @@
 {
   "name": "@img/sharp-darwin-x64",
-  "version": "0.34.3-rc.0",
+  "version": "0.34.3-rc.1",
   "description": "Prebuilt sharp for use with macOS x64",
   "author": "Lovell Fuller <npm@lovell.info>",
   "homepage": "https://sharp.pixelplumbing.com",
diff --git a/npm/linux-arm/package.json b/npm/linux-arm/package.json
index 35cbec20..98f380cb 100644
--- a/npm/linux-arm/package.json
+++ b/npm/linux-arm/package.json
@@ -1,6 +1,6 @@
 {
   "name": "@img/sharp-linux-arm",
-  "version": "0.34.3-rc.0",
+  "version": "0.34.3-rc.1",
   "description": "Prebuilt sharp for use with Linux (glibc) ARM (32-bit)",
   "author": "Lovell Fuller <npm@lovell.info>",
   "homepage": "https://sharp.pixelplumbing.com",
diff --git a/npm/linux-arm64/package.json b/npm/linux-arm64/package.json
index 3a1a474c..108a4d3e 100644
--- a/npm/linux-arm64/package.json
+++ b/npm/linux-arm64/package.json
@@ -1,6 +1,6 @@
 {
   "name": "@img/sharp-linux-arm64",
-  "version": "0.34.3-rc.0",
+  "version": "0.34.3-rc.1",
   "description": "Prebuilt sharp for use with Linux (glibc) 64-bit ARM",
   "author": "Lovell Fuller <npm@lovell.info>",
   "homepage": "https://sharp.pixelplumbing.com",
diff --git a/npm/linux-ppc64/package.json b/npm/linux-ppc64/package.json
index 46294d69..bcecdb41 100644
--- a/npm/linux-ppc64/package.json
+++ b/npm/linux-ppc64/package.json
@@ -1,6 +1,6 @@
 {
   "name": "@img/sharp-linux-ppc64",
-  "version": "0.34.3-rc.0",
+  "version": "0.34.3-rc.1",
   "description": "Prebuilt sharp for use with Linux (glibc) ppc64",
   "author": "Lovell Fuller <npm@lovell.info>",
   "homepage": "https://sharp.pixelplumbing.com",
diff --git a/npm/linux-s390x/package.json b/npm/linux-s390x/package.json
index 54ed7750..8f84c72c 100644
--- a/npm/linux-s390x/package.json
+++ b/npm/linux-s390x/package.json
@@ -1,6 +1,6 @@
 {
   "name": "@img/sharp-linux-s390x",
-  "version": "0.34.3-rc.0",
+  "version": "0.34.3-rc.1",
   "description": "Prebuilt sharp for use with Linux (glibc) s390x",
   "author": "Lovell Fuller <npm@lovell.info>",
   "homepage": "https://sharp.pixelplumbing.com",
diff --git a/npm/linux-x64/package.json b/npm/linux-x64/package.json
index 1354d08a..27d2d217 100644
--- a/npm/linux-x64/package.json
+++ b/npm/linux-x64/package.json
@@ -1,6 +1,6 @@
 {
   "name": "@img/sharp-linux-x64",
-  "version": "0.34.3-rc.0",
+  "version": "0.34.3-rc.1",
   "description": "Prebuilt sharp for use with Linux (glibc) x64",
   "author": "Lovell Fuller <npm@lovell.info>",
   "homepage": "https://sharp.pixelplumbing.com",
diff --git a/npm/linuxmusl-arm64/package.json b/npm/linuxmusl-arm64/package.json
index f9c71b1e..3a45ea9d 100644
--- a/npm/linuxmusl-arm64/package.json
+++ b/npm/linuxmusl-arm64/package.json
@@ -1,6 +1,6 @@
 {
   "name": "@img/sharp-linuxmusl-arm64",
-  "version": "0.34.3-rc.0",
+  "version": "0.34.3-rc.1",
   "description": "Prebuilt sharp for use with Linux (musl) 64-bit ARM",
   "author": "Lovell Fuller <npm@lovell.info>",
   "homepage": "https://sharp.pixelplumbing.com",
diff --git a/npm/linuxmusl-x64/package.json b/npm/linuxmusl-x64/package.json
index 99685f8d..2b0fd5ae 100644
--- a/npm/linuxmusl-x64/package.json
+++ b/npm/linuxmusl-x64/package.json
@@ -1,6 +1,6 @@
 {
   "name": "@img/sharp-linuxmusl-x64",
-  "version": "0.34.3-rc.0",
+  "version": "0.34.3-rc.1",
   "description": "Prebuilt sharp for use with Linux (musl) x64",
   "author": "Lovell Fuller <npm@lovell.info>",
   "homepage": "https://sharp.pixelplumbing.com",
diff --git a/npm/package.json b/npm/package.json
index de00c0dd..a6760d6e 100644
--- a/npm/package.json
+++ b/npm/package.json
@@ -1,6 +1,6 @@
 {
   "name": "@img/sharp",
-  "version": "0.34.3-rc.0",
+  "version": "0.34.3-rc.1",
   "private": "true",
   "workspaces": [
     "darwin-arm64",
diff --git a/npm/wasm32/package.json b/npm/wasm32/package.json
index 9ed9a02c..fe0fe694 100644
--- a/npm/wasm32/package.json
+++ b/npm/wasm32/package.json
@@ -1,6 +1,6 @@
 {
   "name": "@img/sharp-wasm32",
-  "version": "0.34.3-rc.0",
+  "version": "0.34.3-rc.1",
   "description": "Prebuilt sharp for use with wasm32",
   "author": "Lovell Fuller <npm@lovell.info>",
   "homepage": "https://sharp.pixelplumbing.com",
diff --git a/npm/win32-arm64/package.json b/npm/win32-arm64/package.json
index 35a5da2c..31043c3c 100644
--- a/npm/win32-arm64/package.json
+++ b/npm/win32-arm64/package.json
@@ -1,6 +1,6 @@
 {
   "name": "@img/sharp-win32-arm64",
-  "version": "0.34.3-rc.0",
+  "version": "0.34.3-rc.1",
   "description": "Prebuilt sharp for use with Windows 64-bit ARM",
   "author": "Lovell Fuller <npm@lovell.info>",
   "homepage": "https://sharp.pixelplumbing.com",
diff --git a/npm/win32-ia32/package.json b/npm/win32-ia32/package.json
index 52c7beb7..7f589069 100644
--- a/npm/win32-ia32/package.json
+++ b/npm/win32-ia32/package.json
@@ -1,6 +1,6 @@
 {
   "name": "@img/sharp-win32-ia32",
-  "version": "0.34.3-rc.0",
+  "version": "0.34.3-rc.1",
   "description": "Prebuilt sharp for use with Windows x86 (32-bit)",
   "author": "Lovell Fuller <npm@lovell.info>",
   "homepage": "https://sharp.pixelplumbing.com",
diff --git a/npm/win32-x64/package.json b/npm/win32-x64/package.json
index 5f0f67b3..f5967aa8 100644
--- a/npm/win32-x64/package.json
+++ b/npm/win32-x64/package.json
@@ -1,6 +1,6 @@
 {
   "name": "@img/sharp-win32-x64",
-  "version": "0.34.3-rc.0",
+  "version": "0.34.3-rc.1",
   "description": "Prebuilt sharp for use with Windows x64",
   "author": "Lovell Fuller <npm@lovell.info>",
   "homepage": "https://sharp.pixelplumbing.com",
diff --git a/package.json b/package.json
index 282d2154..174671cb 100644
--- a/package.json
+++ b/package.json
@@ -1,7 +1,7 @@
 {
   "name": "sharp",
   "description": "High performance Node.js image processing, the fastest module to resize JPEG, PNG, WebP, GIF, AVIF and TIFF images",
-  "version": "0.34.3-rc.0",
+  "version": "0.34.3-rc.1",
   "author": "Lovell Fuller <npm@lovell.info>",
   "homepage": "https://sharp.pixelplumbing.com",
   "contributors": [
@@ -141,8 +141,8 @@
     "semver": "^7.7.2"
   },
   "optionalDependencies": {
-    "@img/sharp-darwin-arm64": "0.34.3-rc.0",
-    "@img/sharp-darwin-x64": "0.34.3-rc.0",
+    "@img/sharp-darwin-arm64": "0.34.3-rc.1",
+    "@img/sharp-darwin-x64": "0.34.3-rc.1",
     "@img/sharp-libvips-darwin-arm64": "1.2.0",
     "@img/sharp-libvips-darwin-x64": "1.2.0",
     "@img/sharp-libvips-linux-arm": "1.2.0",
@@ -152,17 +152,17 @@
     "@img/sharp-libvips-linux-x64": "1.2.0",
     "@img/sharp-libvips-linuxmusl-arm64": "1.2.0",
     "@img/sharp-libvips-linuxmusl-x64": "1.2.0",
-    "@img/sharp-linux-arm": "0.34.3-rc.0",
-    "@img/sharp-linux-arm64": "0.34.3-rc.0",
-    "@img/sharp-linux-ppc64": "0.34.3-rc.0",
-    "@img/sharp-linux-s390x": "0.34.3-rc.0",
-    "@img/sharp-linux-x64": "0.34.3-rc.0",
-    "@img/sharp-linuxmusl-arm64": "0.34.3-rc.0",
-    "@img/sharp-linuxmusl-x64": "0.34.3-rc.0",
-    "@img/sharp-wasm32": "0.34.3-rc.0",
-    "@img/sharp-win32-arm64": "0.34.3-rc.0",
-    "@img/sharp-win32-ia32": "0.34.3-rc.0",
-    "@img/sharp-win32-x64": "0.34.3-rc.0"
+    "@img/sharp-linux-arm": "0.34.3-rc.1",
+    "@img/sharp-linux-arm64": "0.34.3-rc.1",
+    "@img/sharp-linux-ppc64": "0.34.3-rc.1",
+    "@img/sharp-linux-s390x": "0.34.3-rc.1",
+    "@img/sharp-linux-x64": "0.34.3-rc.1",
+    "@img/sharp-linuxmusl-arm64": "0.34.3-rc.1",
+    "@img/sharp-linuxmusl-x64": "0.34.3-rc.1",
+    "@img/sharp-wasm32": "0.34.3-rc.1",
+    "@img/sharp-win32-arm64": "0.34.3-rc.1",
+    "@img/sharp-win32-ia32": "0.34.3-rc.1",
+    "@img/sharp-win32-x64": "0.34.3-rc.1"
   },
   "devDependencies": {
     "@emnapi/runtime": "^1.4.4",