Making search failures less frustrating

Last week, I covered the basics of accessible site search: proper labels, announcing results, and structured output. But what about when search doesn’t go perfectly? Users make typos. They use different terminology than your site does. They search for things you don’t have. Good search design helps users before they fail and after they fail.

Autocomplete: preventing failures before they happen

Autocomplete suggestions guide users toward successful searches. As they type “runn” you show “running shoes,” and they can select it. This prevents typos and helps users discover the right terminology.

For accessibility, autocomplete requires keyboard navigation (using the arrow keys to navigate through suggestions), screen reader announcements of suggestions and the highlighted one, and a way to dismiss the list (using the Escape key).

The ARIA combobox pattern handles this, but it’s complex. If you’re implementing autocomplete from scratch, read the ARIA Authoring Practices Guide section on combobox first. Getting it wrong creates more problems than it solves. Better yet, use a library like Downshift or Reach UI Combobox that handles the accessibility requirements.

“No results” states: helping users recover

Even with autocomplete, searches sometimes fail. Don’t just say “No results found” and leave users stuck.

Offer alternatives: suggest spelling corrections (“Did you mean running shoes?”), show near matches (“No exact matches – showing results for sneakers”), provide popular searches or categories, or give users a way to contact support.

The key is giving users a next step. Dead ends are frustrating for everyone, but especially for screen reader users who can’t quickly scan the page for alternatives.

Announce “no results” too

Use the same ARIA live region you use for successful results. “No results found for running shoes” tells screen reader users that the search completed, but it didn’t find any results. Without an announcement, they might think it’s still loading.

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Good search anticipates failure. Autocomplete prevents it by guiding users toward successful queries. Helpful “no results” states recover from it by offering alternatives. Both patterns make search more forgiving for everyone.