diff --git a/R/package.R b/R/package.R
index 6747f92f7..821144c8c 100644
--- a/R/package.R
+++ b/R/package.R
@@ -178,13 +178,8 @@ pkgdown_config_path <- function(path) {
   )
 }
 
-read_meta <- function(path, check_path = TRUE, call = caller_env()) {
-  if (check_path) {
-    # check_path = FALSE can be used to supply a direct path to
-    # read_meta instead of a pkgdown object.
-    path <- pkgdown_config_path(path)
-  }
-
+read_meta <- function(path, call = caller_env()) {
+  path <- pkgdown_config_path(path)
   if (is.null(path)) {
     yaml <- list()
   } else {
diff --git a/tests/testthat/_snaps/package.md b/tests/testthat/_snaps/package.md
index 01fdc3913..7482d9d7a 100644
--- a/tests/testthat/_snaps/package.md
+++ b/tests/testthat/_snaps/package.md
@@ -23,9 +23,9 @@
 # read_meta() errors gracefully if _pkgdown.yml failed to parse
 
     Code
-      read_meta(file, check_path = FALSE)
+      as_pkgdown(test_path("assets/bad-yaml"))
     Condition
-      Error:
+      Error in `as_pkgdown()`:
       x Could not parse the config file.
       ! Parser error: while parsing a block mapping at line 1, column 1 did not find expected key at line 9, column 3
       i Edit 'assets/bad-yaml/_pkgdown.yml' to fix the problem.
diff --git a/tests/testthat/assets/bad-yaml/DESCRIPTION b/tests/testthat/assets/bad-yaml/DESCRIPTION
new file mode 100644
index 000000000..3da3a37bf
--- /dev/null
+++ b/tests/testthat/assets/bad-yaml/DESCRIPTION
@@ -0,0 +1,13 @@
+Package: kittens
+Version: 1.0.0
+Title: A test package
+Description: A longer statement about the package.
+Authors@R: c(
+    person("Hadley", "Wickham", , "hadley@rstudio.com", role = c("aut", "cre")),
+    person("RStudio", role = c("cph", "fnd"))
+    )
+RoxygenNote: 6.0.1
+Suggests: 
+    knitr,
+    rmarkdown
+VignetteBuilder: knitr
diff --git a/tests/testthat/test-package.R b/tests/testthat/test-package.R
index ca56ca769..ffd061f51 100644
--- a/tests/testthat/test-package.R
+++ b/tests/testthat/test-package.R
@@ -84,12 +84,8 @@ test_that("titles don't get autolinked code", {
 })
 
 test_that("read_meta() errors gracefully if _pkgdown.yml failed to parse", {
-  file <- test_path("assets", "bad-yaml", "_pkgdown.yml")
   expect_snapshot(
     error = TRUE,
-    read_meta(
-      file,
-      check_path = FALSE
-    )
+    as_pkgdown(test_path("assets/bad-yaml"))
   )
 })