diff --git a/R/forde.R b/R/forde.R
index e063b11..d53973e 100644
--- a/R/forde.R
+++ b/R/forde.R
@@ -152,8 +152,8 @@ forde <- function(
   classes <- sapply(x, class)
   x <- suppressWarnings(prep_x(x))
   factor_cols <- sapply(x, is.factor)
-  lvls <- arf$forest$covariate.levels[factor_cols]
-  if (!is.null(lvls)) {
+  if (any(factor_cols)) {
+    lvls <- lapply(x[, factor_cols, drop = FALSE], levels)
     names(lvls) <- colnames_x[factor_cols]
     lvl_df <- rbindlist(lapply(seq_along(lvls), function(j) {
       melt(as.data.table(lvls[j]), measure.vars = names(lvls)[j], 
diff --git a/tests/testthat/test-return_types.R b/tests/testthat/test-return_types.R
index 31a95d6..a60b34e 100644
--- a/tests/testthat/test-return_types.R
+++ b/tests/testthat/test-return_types.R
@@ -80,6 +80,20 @@ test_that("FORGE returns same column types", {
   expect_equal(classes, classes_synth)
 })
 
+test_that("FORGE returns factors with same levels (and order of levels)", {
+  arf <- adversarial_rf(iris, num_trees = 2, verbose = FALSE, parallel = FALSE)
+  psi <- forde(arf, iris, parallel = FALSE)
+  x_synth <- forge(psi, n_synth = 10, parallel = FALSE)
+  expect_equal(levels(x_synth$Species), levels(iris$Species))
+})
+
+test_that("EXPCT returns factors with same levels (and order of levels)", {
+  arf <- adversarial_rf(iris, num_trees = 2, verbose = FALSE, parallel = FALSE)
+  psi <- forde(arf, iris, parallel = FALSE)
+  x_synth <- expct(psi, parallel = FALSE)
+  expect_equal(levels(x_synth$Species), levels(iris$Species))
+})
+
 # test_that("MAP returns proper column types", {
 #   n <- 50
 #   dat <- data.frame(numeric = rnorm(n),