Is your website accessible? Six checks anyone can do

The short answer: an accessible site is one that also works for people who do not see well, cannot tell colours apart, do not use a mouse or read with a screen reader. That is a lot of people, and almost everything done for them improves the site for everyone, Google included. These six checks take an afternoon and need no technical knowledge.

The six checks

1 Use the site with the keyboard only. Press Tab to move through links and buttons, and Enter to open them. Can you reach everything? Can you see, at each step, where you are (an outline or highlight)? If the highlight vanishes or you get stuck in a menu, that is a problem.
2 Check the contrast. Text must stand out clearly from the background. The most used rule, from the WCAG guidelines, asks for a ratio of at least 4.5 to 1 for normal text. Light grey on white usually fails. There are free contrast checkers: just give them the two colours.
3 Add alternative text to images that say something. People using a screen reader hear that text. See Alt text and file names for images.
4 Enlarge the text to 200% (with Ctrl and +) and view the site on a phone. Nothing should be cut off, overlapping or force sideways scrolling. See also A site for slow mobile data.
5 Look at the forms. Each field should have visible text saying what it is, not only grey text inside the field that disappears when you type. Errors should say what to fix, not just paint the field red (people who cannot tell colours apart will not see it).
6 Review the headings and links. Headings should follow an order (one main heading, then secondary ones) and links should make sense on their own: “see the plans” rather than “click here”.

Helpers to start with

Tool What it does
Lighthouse, in Chrome’s developer tools It has an accessibility audit that points out contrast, images without alternative text and fields without a name.
A screen reader (the system’s own) Listening to your site for five minutes teaches more than any list.
Ask someone to test it A person who uses assistive technology sees what the tools do not.
Automatic tools only catch part of the problems. Passing an audit does not mean the site is accessible. And legal requirements vary by country and by type of business: check what applies to yours.
If you build pages with a visual builder, choose the template with an eye on contrast and the keyboard. See WordPress block editor or Elementor.

Want help reading the result of an audit of your site? Open a ticket with the address and the report.

Open a support ticket

SEE ALSO

Alt text and file names for images: what to write, and what to avoid

A site that loads on slow mobile data: how to make it lighter

A website form that is safe and spam-free: honeypot, captcha and validation

Core Web Vitals in plain words

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