diff --git a/include/qemu/cutils.h b/include/qemu/cutils.h
index d249f22676..ad4c778ea3 100644
--- a/include/qemu/cutils.h
+++ b/include/qemu/cutils.h
@@ -19,6 +19,23 @@ const char *si_prefix(unsigned int exp10);
  */
 const char *iec_binary_prefix(unsigned int exp2);
 
+const char *str_array_elem_or_null(const char *const *array,
+                                   size_t nelem, uint64_t index);
+
+/**
+ * STR_ARRAY_ELEM_OR_NULL() - Return a string array element, or NULL if
+ *                            out of bounds
+ * @array: array of strings to index
+ * @index: index of the element to return
+ *
+ * Return @array[@index] if @index is a valid index, otherwise return
+ * NULL. @index is converted to uint64_t, so negative values of signed
+ * types are out of bounds and also yield NULL. Useful to look up entries
+ * in enum-indexed string tables without a prior bounds check.
+ */
+#define STR_ARRAY_ELEM_OR_NULL(array, index) \
+    str_array_elem_or_null(array, ARRAY_SIZE(array), index)
+
 /**
  * pstrcpy:
  * @buf: buffer to copy string into
diff --git a/include/qemu/osdep.h b/include/qemu/osdep.h
index 5d5695ade2..50c7ce33b6 100644
--- a/include/qemu/osdep.h
+++ b/include/qemu/osdep.h
@@ -532,6 +532,9 @@ void QEMU_ERROR("code path is reachable")
  * ARRAY_SIZE() - Return the number of elements of an array
  * @x: the array
  *
+ * For bounds-checked lookups in arrays of strings, see
+ * STR_ARRAY_ELEM_OR_NULL() in "qemu/cutils.h".
+ *
  * Note: fails to build if @x is a pointer.
  */
 #ifndef ARRAY_SIZE
diff --git a/util/cutils.c b/util/cutils.c
index 91ddadfd15..d8a04ead5a 100644
--- a/util/cutils.c
+++ b/util/cutils.c
@@ -954,6 +954,12 @@ const char *iec_binary_prefix(unsigned int exp2)
     return prefixes[exp2 / 10];
 }
 
+const char *str_array_elem_or_null(const char *const *array,
+                                   size_t nelem, uint64_t index)
+{
+    return index >= nelem ? NULL : array[index];
+}
+
 /*
  * Return human readable string for size @val.
  * @val can be anything that uint64_t allows (no more than "16 EiB").