I'd like to know which of this two expression is grammatically correct to show in a message in a website, when the users filter and there's no data returned from the server.

  • 1
    Both seem correct to me, the difference is in the tense – Irhala Dec 1 '16 at 13:47
  • 1
    "No matches found" is an elided version of either "There were no matches found" or "No matches were found". It's not strictly "correct" in terms of syntax, as it isn't a complete sentence, but it is considered acceptable in all but the most formal registers. – Hot Licks Dec 1 '16 at 13:57

One difference I can think of (though both variants are indeed correct, as has already been commented) is related to whether your message appears during or after, say, the search.

"No answers were found" is quite explicit as to what is meant:

A search was done, but it yielded no results.

"No answers found", on the other hand, loose as it is, may connote that the search didn't yield and is still not yielding any results, so it may be more suitable in case the message appears in real-time, while the search is still being executed.

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