What is web accessibility?
When you design and build websites and web tools properly, disabled people can use them. Unfortunately, many sites and tools are developed in a way that makes them difficult or impossible for some people to use.
Web accessibility opens up your products and services to many more individuals, which in turn is good for business. International web standards define what you need to do for accessibility.
Why accessibility is important
- Accessibility improves user experience for disabled people, older people, people who use older devices and for people in developing countries.
- At some point in their life, everyone will experience a (temporary) disability.
- Accessibility is a legal requirement in many countries.
- At least 15% of the world’s population has a recognized disability. Accessibility opens up your services to this market.
What is accessibility and why is it important?Here’s what you need to know as a project manager
- Learn what everybody on your team needs to do to make your services accessible. The list below should help you with that.
- Reserve time for accessibility throughout the project. Make sure to also do this in sprint planning.
- Read the requirements and the WCAG standard.
- Make accessibility part of the Definition of Done for the project.
Legislation and guidelines
Different countries have different laws around accessibility. W3C’s Web Accessibility Initiative has an extensive list of laws and policies around the world.
In general international laws refer to the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG).
What every person on your team needs to do
Content
- Writers, Content Editors, Content Designers, Content Strategists, Content Managers.
At a glance
- Write content in a clear and understandable way
- Provide text alternatives for non-text content (images, video, audio).
- Do not rely on sensory characteristics as the only indicator, such as shape, color or orientation (“click the red button on the right”).
- Links should describe where the user will go if they click it, giving them an idea of what will happen.
More resources for accessible content
UX Design
- Interaction Designers, User Experience Designers, User Researchers.
At a glance
- Do not rely solely on sensory characteristics, such as shape, color or orientation (e.g. a red or green dot for indicating a status).
- Don’t design for mouse interactions exclusively (think of functionality that’s only available on mouseover, or drag-and-drop interfaces).
- Include a diverse group of users, including disabled people in your user research and usability testing.
More resources for accessible UX design
Visual Design
- UI Designers, Visual Designers, Graphic Designers.
At a glance
- Make sure there’s enough color contrast in your designs; a contrast ratio of 4.5 : 1 is the minimum.
- Design styles for both mouse (hover) and keyboard (focus) interaction.
- Don’t rely on color alone to communicate information (e.g. red borders for input fields that have errors).
More resources for accessible visual design
Frontend Development
- Frontend Developers, UX Engineers, Frontend Designers, Javascript Developers.
At a glance
- Write semantic HTML.
- Provide labels for all form controls.
- Ensure that all interactive element are keyboard accessible (use
<button>,<a>and<input>).
More resources for accessible frontend development
Quality Assurance
- Software Testers, Test Engineers, Quality Assurance Officers.
At a glance
- Read the requirements and the success criteria for WCAG compliance.
- Run an automated accessibility checker. Here’s how different accessibility testing tools compare.
- Run a manual test each release for common accessibility pitfalls.