diff --git a/Lib/pstats.py b/Lib/pstats.py
index 07ecda07796e44..b599d95909fdb1 100644
--- a/Lib/pstats.py
+++ b/Lib/pstats.py
@@ -150,6 +150,7 @@ def load_stats(self, arg):
             except:  # in case this is not unix
                 pass
             self.files = [arg]
+            return
         elif hasattr(arg, 'create_stats'):
             arg.create_stats()
             self.stats = arg.stats
diff --git a/Lib/test/test_pstats.py b/Lib/test/test_pstats.py
index a26a8c1d522a70..23070902493ea5 100644
--- a/Lib/test/test_pstats.py
+++ b/Lib/test/test_pstats.py
@@ -45,6 +45,18 @@ def test_add(self):
         stats = pstats.Stats(stream=stream)
         stats.add(self.stats, self.stats)
 
+    def test_empty_stats(self):
+        # gh-109500: Empty profiling data must not prevent loading or
+        # combining statistics.
+        stats_file = support.findfile('pstats.pck')
+        profile = cProfile.Profile()
+        with tempfile.TemporaryDirectory() as tmpdir:
+            filename = os.path.join(tmpdir, 'empty.prof')
+            profile.dump_stats(filename)
+            self.assertEqual(pstats.Stats(profile, filename).stats, {})
+            stats = pstats.Stats(filename, stats_file)
+            self.assertEqual(stats.stats, self.stats.stats)
+
     def test_dump_and_load_works_correctly(self):
         temp_storage_new = tempfile.NamedTemporaryFile(delete=False)
         try:
diff --git a/Misc/NEWS.d/next/Library/2026-09-28-20-09-02.gh-issue-109500._T9cBe.rst b/Misc/NEWS.d/next/Library/2026-09-28-20-09-02.gh-issue-109500._T9cBe.rst
new file mode 100644
index 00000000000000..d7440bedd885f5
--- /dev/null
+++ b/Misc/NEWS.d/next/Library/2026-09-28-20-09-02.gh-issue-109500._T9cBe.rst
@@ -0,0 +1,2 @@
+Fix :class:`pstats.Stats` and :meth:`pstats.Stats.add` raising
+:exc:`TypeError` when loading files containing empty profiling data.