As you design, develop, or create digital content, use one or more methods to check accessibility.
Accessibility Evaluation Guides and Checklists
Checklists and evaluation guides are one way to help ensure the accessibility of your digital content, and we have provided a list of some below.
- Word and PowerPoint Accessibility Checklist (WebAIM)
- Web Accessibility Easy Checks (W3C)
- How to Meet WCAG Quick Reference (W3C)
- WebAIM Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) 2 Checklist
- Deque Web Accessibility Checklist
- 18F Web Accessibility Checklist
- Elsevier Web Content Accessibility Guidelines 2.1 Checklist
- Web Accessibility Testing Quick Reference (WebAIM)
- ICT Testing Baseline for Web Accessibility (US Access Board)
- intopia Accessibility Guidance Tool (BETA)
- Evaluating Cognitive Web Accessibility (WebAIM)
- MagentaA11y Accessibility Acceptance Criteria Tool (T-Mobile)
- Quick Non-technical Accessibility Tests (University of Michigan)
Automated Accessibility Tools
Automated checkers are quick and easy to evaluate digital content for accessibility but can’t check for every potential accessibility issue. The list below contains different types of checkers.
To determine text legibility and visual contrast, use a color checker. The list below contains some popular contrast checkers, but many color contrast checker tools are available online.
Assistive Technologies
Automated checkers are helpful, but they cannot verify all issues. Testing with assistive technology, such as screen readers, can help identify accessibility problems and usability issues. Learn more about Assistive Technology.
Try screen reader keyboard commands and gestures used to read and navigate content with the following screen readers on the Windows and Mac operating systems:
- Job Access With Speech (JAWS) – a popular screen reader for Windows.
- NonVisual Desktop Access (NVDA) – an open-source screen reader for Windows.
- VoiceOver – Apple’s built-in screen reader with macOS and iOS.
For website evaluations using screen readers, try WebAIM’s in-depth tutorials:
VoiceOver (iOS)
TalkBack (Android)
Resources
- Accessibility Testing with the NVDA Screenreader (Deque video)
- How to set up and use NVDA to read a website for accessibility testing (A video demonstration by Missouri AT)
- NVDA Basics (Indiana University)
- Screen Reader Demo for Digital Accessibility (UCSF video)
- Screen Reader Basics: NVDA (Google Chrome Developers video)