diff --git a/man/coredumpctl.xml b/man/coredumpctl.xml
index 6db9bca068..6179d6b760 100644
--- a/man/coredumpctl.xml
+++ b/man/coredumpctl.xml
@@ -389,7 +389,10 @@
 
   <refsect1>
     <title>Exit status</title>
-    <para>On success, 0 is returned; otherwise, a non-zero failure code is returned.</para>
+    <para>On success, 0 is returned; otherwise, a non-zero failure
+    code is returned. Not finding any matching core dumps is treated as
+    failure.
+    </para>
   </refsect1>
 
   <refsect1>
diff --git a/src/coredump/coredumpctl.c b/src/coredump/coredumpctl.c
index 4a25a2fb70..e7d0dd34c0 100644
--- a/src/coredump/coredumpctl.c
+++ b/src/coredump/coredumpctl.c
@@ -963,10 +963,9 @@ static int dump_list(int argc, char **argv, void *userdata) {
                 }
 
                 if (!arg_field && n_found <= 0) {
-                        if (!arg_quiet && !sd_json_format_enabled(arg_json_format_flags))
+                        if (!arg_quiet)
                                 log_notice("No coredumps found.");
-
-                        return 0;
+                        return -ESRCH;
                 }
         }