Hello Sean,

The observed behavior indeed seems a bit strange in some scenarios, but it is by design and conformant with the current Grid rendering. The main reason for the observed behavior is that when there are locked columns, the non-scrollable (locked) and scrollable sections of the Grid are rendered in two separate tables. This brings certain limitations that are listed in the following documentation section:

https://www.telerik.com/kendo-angular-ui-develop/components/grid/columns/locked#known-limitations

By default, the "no data" template is rendered in the non-locked table, but obviously, we can think of some alternative which accommodates the locked columns scenario better.

This is why we will not be treating it as a bug, but rather as an area for improvement. I switched this case to a feature request in our Feedback portal. We will track the customer demand, and prioritize accordingly based on the interest, and the perceived business value.

I also logged a dedicated issue to our public Kendo Themes repository, and the case will be further investigated by our front end experts and designers, so that they can come up with a better user experience:

https://github.com/telerik/kendo-themes/issues/5275

Once the design, styling and rendering are updated, we will adopt the enhancements as soon as possible.

Meanwhile, as a workaround, I can suggest toggling the locked state of the column(s) dynamically to render the "No records" template in the center of the Grid:

https://stackblitz.com/edit/angular-qdn74kgy-pfc8kkpf?file=src%2Fapp%2Fapp.component.ts

I hope this helps.

Regards,
Dimiter Topalov
Progress Telerik