diff --git a/README.md b/README.md
index 8b56f40..7f78f3f 100644
--- a/README.md
+++ b/README.md
@@ -70,6 +70,12 @@ Pass `NULL` or `nullptr` to `npf_[v]snprintf` to write nothing, and only return
 
 nanoprintf does *not* provide `printf` or `putchar` itself; those are seen as system-level services and nanoprintf is a utility library. nanoprintf is hopefully a good building block for rolling your own `printf`, though.
 
+### Return Values
+
+The nanoprintf functions all return the same value: the number of characters that were either sent to the callback (for npf_pprintf) or the number of characters that would have been written to the buffer provided sufficient space. The null-terminator 0 byte is not part of the count.
+
+The C Standard allows for the printf functions to return negative values in case string or character encodings can not be performed, or if the output stream encounters EOF. Since nanoprintf is oblivious to OS resources like files, and does not support the `l` length modifier for `wchar_t` support, any runtime errors are either internal bugs (please report!) or incorrect usage. Because of this, nanoprintf only returns non-negative values representing how many bytes the formatted string contains (again, minus the null-terminator byte).
+
 ## Configuration
 
 ### Features
diff --git a/nanoprintf.h b/nanoprintf.h
index dffa1ad..290ddfe 100644
--- a/nanoprintf.h
+++ b/nanoprintf.h
@@ -29,6 +29,11 @@
 extern "C" {
 #endif
 
+// The npf_ functions all return the number of bytes required to express the
+// fully-formatted string, not including the null terminator character.
+// The npf_ functions do not return negative values, since the lack of 'l' length
+// modifier support makes encoding errors impossible.
+
 NPF_VISIBILITY int npf_snprintf(
   char *buffer, size_t bufsz, const char *format, ...) NPF_PRINTF_ATTR(3, 4);