diff --git a/CHANGELOG.rst b/CHANGELOG.rst
index 30e7da8d394..b14d38d7aad 100644
--- a/CHANGELOG.rst
+++ b/CHANGELOG.rst
@@ -26,6 +26,7 @@ Bugfixes
 - elb_application_lb - fix ``KeyError`` when balancing across two Target Groups (https://github.com/ansible-collections/community.aws/issues/1089).
 - elb_classic_lb - fix ``'NoneType' object has no attribute`` bug when creating a new ELB in check mode with a health check (https://github.com/ansible-collections/amazon.aws/pull/915).
 - elb_classic_lb - fix ``'NoneType' object has no attribute`` bug when creating a new ELB using security group names (https://github.com/ansible-collections/amazon.aws/issues/914).
+- s3_object - fix ignore_nonexistent_bucket is not used when listing a bucket (https://github.com/ansible-collections/amazon.aws/issues/966).
 
 v4.0.0
 ======
diff --git a/plugins/modules/s3_object.py b/plugins/modules/s3_object.py
index dcefbcae674..7f979719eef 100644
--- a/plugins/modules/s3_object.py
+++ b/plugins/modules/s3_object.py
@@ -1168,10 +1168,9 @@ def main():
 
     # Support for listing a set of keys
     if mode == 'list':
-        exists = bucket_check(module, s3, bucket)
 
         # If the bucket does not exist then bail out
-        if not exists:
+        if not bucketrtn:
             module.fail_json(msg="Target bucket (%s) cannot be found" % bucket)
 
         list_keys(module, s3, bucket, prefix, marker, max_keys)