diff --git a/frontend_tests/node_tests/narrow_unread.js b/frontend_tests/node_tests/narrow_unread.js
index d527b76e6b..67a4651166 100644
--- a/frontend_tests/node_tests/narrow_unread.js
+++ b/frontend_tests/node_tests/narrow_unread.js
@@ -143,4 +143,11 @@ function assert_unread_info(expected) {
     blueslip.set_test_data('warn', 'Unknown emails: bob@example.com');
     unread_ids = narrow_state.get_unread_ids();
     assert.deepEqual(unread_ids, []);
+
+    terms = [
+        {operator: 'is', operand: 'starred'},
+    ];
+    set_filter(terms);
+    unread_ids = narrow_state.get_unread_ids();
+    assert.deepEqual(unread_ids, []);
 }());
diff --git a/frontend_tests/node_tests/unread.js b/frontend_tests/node_tests/unread.js
index 62e0fceef6..6eb1a4c815 100644
--- a/frontend_tests/node_tests/unread.js
+++ b/frontend_tests/node_tests/unread.js
@@ -479,6 +479,12 @@ stream_data.get_stream_id = function () {
     assert.equal(counts.mentioned_message_count, 0);
 }());
 
+(function test_starring() {
+    // We don't need any setup here, because we just hard code
+    // this to [] in the code.
+    assert.deepEqual(unread.get_msg_ids_for_starred(), []);
+}());
+
 (function test_declare_bankruptcy() {
     var message = {
         id: 16,
diff --git a/static/js/narrow_state.js b/static/js/narrow_state.js
index 6456376d21..9a93a07b61 100644
--- a/static/js/narrow_state.js
+++ b/static/js/narrow_state.js
@@ -236,6 +236,10 @@ exports.get_unread_ids = function () {
         return unread.get_msg_ids_for_mentions();
     }
 
+    if (current_filter.is_for_only('starred')) {
+        return unread.get_msg_ids_for_starred();
+    }
+
     return;
 };
 
diff --git a/static/js/unread.js b/static/js/unread.js
index c7be0682e5..ebbdc9f8b4 100644
--- a/static/js/unread.js
+++ b/static/js/unread.js
@@ -539,6 +539,14 @@ exports.get_msg_ids_for_mentions = function () {
     return util.sorted_ids(ids);
 };
 
+exports.get_msg_ids_for_starred = function () {
+    // This is here for API consistency sake--we never
+    // have unread starred messages.  (Some day we may ironically
+    // want to make starring the same as mark-as-unread, but
+    // for now starring === reading.)
+    return [];
+};
+
 exports.load_server_counts = function () {
     var unread_msgs = page_params.unread_msgs;