diff --git a/runtime/src/iree/base/status.h b/runtime/src/iree/base/status.h
index 6aed3c1..f00635c 100644
--- a/runtime/src/iree/base/status.h
+++ b/runtime/src/iree/base/status.h
@@ -501,7 +501,25 @@
                                         iree_host_size_t* out_buffer_length);
 
 // Converts the status to an allocated string value using the given allocator.
-// The caller must free the buffer with |allocator|.
+// |out_buffer| will contain |out_buffer_length| characters as well as a NUL
+// terminator. The caller must free the buffer with |allocator|.
+//
+// NOTE: |allocator| is passed as a pointer to avoid a circular dependency with
+// iree/base/allocator.h (which uses this file a lot more than this file uses
+// it) and must be non-NULL.
+//
+// Example:
+//  iree_allocator_t allocator = iree_allocator_system();
+//  char* buffer = NULL;
+//  iree_host_size_t length = 0;
+//  if (iree_status_to_string(status, &allocator, &buffer, &length)) {
+//    // |buffer| is NUL terminated but if possible use the length.
+//    LOG_MESSAGE("%.*s", (int)length, buffer);
+//    iree_allocator_free(allocator, buffer);
+//  } else {
+//    // Could still use iree_status_code_string to get the status code string.
+//    LOG_MESSAGE("failed to convert status to string");
+//  }
 IREE_API_EXPORT bool iree_status_to_string(iree_status_t status,
                                            const iree_allocator_t* allocator,
                                            char** out_buffer,