diff --git a/modules/adguard.nix b/modules/adguard.nix
index b8cb16a..c0eba2a 100644
--- a/modules/adguard.nix
+++ b/modules/adguard.nix
@@ -97,7 +97,8 @@ in
           querylog_enabled: true
           querylog_file_enabled: true
           statistics_enabled: true
-        '' + lib.optionalString (cfg.clients != []) ''
+
+        ${lib.optionalString (cfg.clients != []) ''
           clients:
             persistent:
               ${lib.concatStringsSep "\n              " (
@@ -107,6 +108,11 @@ in
                       - ${config.sops.placeholder.${client.idSecret}}
                 '') cfg.clients
               )}
+        '' + ''
+          + lib.optionalString (cfg.clients == []) ''
+          clients:
+            persistent: []
+
         '' + ''
 
         filtering: