Systems and methods for performing polar decoding using a transformation of the coded bits prior to polar decoding and an inverse transformation of the resulting data bits after polar decoding are disclosed. In some embodiments, a method of operation of a receiving node to perform polar decoding comprises transforming a received code bit vector yN in accordance with a transformation TN to thereby provide a transformed code bit vector Y′N=YNTN, performing polar decoding of the transformed code bit vector y′N to thereby provide a transformed data bit vector v′N, and inversely transforming the transformed data bit vector v′N in accordance with an inverse transformation TN−1 to thereby provide an estimated data bit vector vN=v′NTN−1. In some embodiments, the transformation TN re-orders coded bits in the coded bit vector yN such that some future frozen bit(s) are swapped in front of some information bit(s) prior to performing polar decoding.