diff --git a/src/regex_impl.cc b/src/regex_impl.cc
index b1630a1f..266f920e 100644
--- a/src/regex_impl.cc
+++ b/src/regex_impl.cc
@@ -886,8 +886,8 @@ private:
     }
 
     // Mutate start_desc with informations on which Codepoint could start a match.
-    // Returns true if the node possibly does not consume the char, in which case
-    // the next node would still be relevant for the parent node start chars computation.
+    // Returns true if the subsequent nodes are still relevant for computing the
+    // start desc
     template<RegexMode direction>
     bool compute_start_desc(ParsedRegex::NodeIndex index,
                              CompiledRegex::StartDesc& start_desc) const
@@ -916,10 +916,20 @@ private:
                     add_multi_byte_utf8();
                 return node.quantifier.allows_none();
             case ParsedRegex::AnyChar:
+                if (start_desc.offset + node.quantifier.max <= CompiledRegex::StartDesc::OffsetLimits::max())
+                {
+                    start_desc.offset += node.quantifier.max;
+                    return true;
+                }
                 for (auto& b : start_desc.map)
                     b = true;
                return node.quantifier.allows_none();
             case ParsedRegex::AnyCharExceptNewLine:
+                if (start_desc.offset + node.quantifier.max <= CompiledRegex::StartDesc::OffsetLimits::max())
+                {
+                    start_desc.offset += node.quantifier.max;
+                    return true;
+                }
                 for (Codepoint cp = 0; cp < single_byte_limit; ++cp)
                 {
                     if (cp != '\n')
@@ -1138,7 +1148,7 @@ String dump_regex(const CompiledRegex& program)
                     res += (char)c;
             }
         }
-        res += "]\n";
+        res += format("]+{}\n", static_cast<int>(desc.offset));
     };
     if (program.forward_start_desc)
         dump_start_desc(*program.forward_start_desc, "forward");
@@ -1556,6 +1566,17 @@ auto test_regex = UnitTest{[]{
         kak_assert(vm.exec("xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx", RegexExecFlags::None));
     }
 
+    {
+        TestVM<RegexMode::Forward | RegexMode::Search> vm{"(.{3,4}|f)oo"};
+        kak_assert(vm.forward_start_desc and vm.forward_start_desc->offset == 4);
+        for (int c = 0; c < CompiledRegex::StartDesc::count; ++c)
+            kak_assert(vm.forward_start_desc->map[c] == (c == 'f' or c == 'o'));
+
+        kak_assert(vm.exec("xxxoo", RegexExecFlags::None));
+        kak_assert(vm.exec("xfoo", RegexExecFlags::None));
+        kak_assert(not vm.exec("😄xoo", RegexExecFlags::None));
+    }
+
     {
         auto eq = [](const CompiledRegex::NamedCapture& lhs,
                      const CompiledRegex::NamedCapture& rhs) {
diff --git a/src/regex_impl.hh b/src/regex_impl.hh
index 80d41dbf..8f11f1af 100644
--- a/src/regex_impl.hh
+++ b/src/regex_impl.hh
@@ -153,6 +153,8 @@ struct CompiledRegex : RefCountable, UseMemoryDomain<MemoryDomain::Regex>
     struct StartDesc : UseMemoryDomain<MemoryDomain::Regex>
     {
         static constexpr Codepoint count = 256;
+        using OffsetLimits = std::numeric_limits<uint8_t>;
+        uint8_t offset = 0;
         bool map[count];
     };
 
@@ -531,15 +533,16 @@ private:
         }
     }
 
-    static Iterator find_next_start(Iterator pos, const ExecConfig& config, const StartDesc& start_desc)
+    static Iterator find_next_start(Iterator start, const ExecConfig& config, const StartDesc& start_desc)
     {
+        auto pos = start;
         while (pos != config.end)
         {
             static_assert(StartDesc::count <= 256, "start desc should be ascii only");
             if constexpr (forward)
             {
                 if (start_desc.map[static_cast<unsigned char>(*pos)])
-                    return pos;
+                    return utf8::advance(pos, start, -CharCount(start_desc.offset));
                 ++pos;
             }
             else