Apparatus, methods and computer program products implement HARQ buffer size reduction by storing successfully received blocks of a multi-block signal in a code block buffer and only storing unsuccessfully received blocks of the multi-block signal in the HARQ buffer. As HARQ retransmissions of the signal occur, previous successfully received blocks are discarded. Blocks that were not successfully received in one or more previous signals but are successfully received in a HARQ retransmission are saved in the code block buffer. The process may continue until all blocks of the multi-block signal have been successfully decoded received and stored in the code block buffer. The successfully received blocks of the multi-block signal are then passed to higher layers.