diff --git a/src/expect-core b/src/expect-core
index cf4fe10..b8b0dbc 100644
--- a/src/expect-core
+++ b/src/expect-core
@@ -37,6 +37,7 @@ _bail_clause()
 _expect--succeed() { test "$1" -eq 0; }
 _expect--fail()    { test "$1" -ne 0; }
 
+
 _expect--output()
 {
   local -r cmp="$2"
@@ -54,3 +55,10 @@ _expect--output()
   diff <( echo $nl "$cmp" ) - &>/dev/null
 }
 
+
+_expect--match()
+{
+  local -r pat="$2"
+  [[ "$(cat)" =~ $pat ]]
+}
+
diff --git a/test/test-expect-core b/test/test-expect-core
index 9cdbde9..437e70d 100644
--- a/test/test-expect-core
+++ b/test/test-expect-core
@@ -79,3 +79,29 @@ describe output
   end
 end
 
+
+describe match
+  it will default to asserting against stdout
+    expect _expect--match 0 "foo" <<< "foo"
+      to succeed
+  end
+
+  it ignores exit code
+    expect _expect--match 1 "foo" <<< "foo"
+      to succeed
+  end
+
+  it will perform partial match
+    expect _expect--match 0 "foo" <<< "contains foo"
+      to succeed
+  end
+
+  it will match against a pattern
+    expect _expect--match 0 "^foo.*baz" <<< "foo bar baz"
+      to succeed
+
+    expect _expect--match 0 "^foo.*baz" <<< "bar foo bar baz"
+      to fail
+  end
+end
+