diff --git a/milli/src/search/criteria/mod.rs b/milli/src/search/criteria/mod.rs
index a6a0c7f92..3657df73e 100644
--- a/milli/src/search/criteria/mod.rs
+++ b/milli/src/search/criteria/mod.rs
@@ -422,6 +422,11 @@ pub fn resolve_phrase(ctx: &dyn Context, phrase: &[Option<String>]) -> Result<Ro
     let mut candidates = RoaringBitmap::new();
     let mut first_iter = true;
     let winsize = phrase.len().min(3);
+
+    if phrase.is_empty() {
+        return Ok(candidates);
+    }
+
     for win in phrase.windows(winsize) {
         // Get all the documents with the matching distance for each word pairs.
         let mut bitmaps = Vec::with_capacity(winsize.pow(2));
diff --git a/milli/tests/search/phrase_search.rs b/milli/tests/search/phrase_search.rs
index 87b3fd511..313833543 100644
--- a/milli/tests/search/phrase_search.rs
+++ b/milli/tests/search/phrase_search.rs
@@ -32,4 +32,13 @@ fn test_phrase_search_with_stop_words() {
     let result = search.execute().unwrap();
     // 1 document should match
     assert_eq!(result.documents_ids.len(), 1);
+
+    // test for a single stop word only, no other search terms
+    let mut search = Search::new(&txn, &index);
+    search.query("\"the\"");
+    search.limit(10);
+    search.authorize_typos(false);
+    search.terms_matching_strategy(TermsMatchingStrategy::All);
+    let result = search.execute().unwrap();
+    assert_eq!(result.documents_ids.len(), 0);
 }