Why to build your next site ADA/WC3/WCAG compliant

Websites that are built ADA-compliant meet the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) Standards for Accessible Design, meaning they’re accessible to people with disabilities. At the highest level, ADA compliance for websites is basically about the following: 

• Compatibility – Is compatible with user assistive technologies

• Design – Uses sufficient color contrast between text and background, legible fonts,and avoids seizure-inducing elements

• Content – Includes alt text for images, captions for videos, and transcripts for audio-based media

• Navigation – Allows for keyboard and mouse navigation, and ensures there isn’t a separate path for users with limitations

In the web development business, a site’s ADA compliance is heavily related to how closely its design and development follow the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG 2.2), which cover a wide range of recommendations for making web content more accessible.

Following these guidelines makes content more accessible to a wider range of people with disabilities, including accommodations for blindness and low vision, deafness and hearing loss, limited movement, speech disabilities, photosensitivity, and combinations of these, and some accommodation for learning disabilities and cognitive limitations; but will not address every user need for people with these disabilities. The guidelines address accessibility of web content on any kind of device (including desktops, laptops, kiosks, and mobile devices). Following the guidelines will also often make web content more usable to users in general.

Here at Productive Machine, we’ve been very focused since 2017 on helping companies saddled with non-compliant sites, by performing remediation projects that improve accessibility. We’ve also made it our policy to execute net new site build as natively accessible as possible for the client company.

Why make accessibility such a point of focus?

• It’s the right thing do do

• It makes your product / services / information available to a much wider market. For example, more than 6 million Americans suffer from vision loss, and over 1 million have total blindness.

• Websites and web accessibility fall under the ADA and other laws; both formal lawsuits and/or click-by lawsuits can be costly and time intensive to resolve.

Automated testing’s a great way to identify accessibility issues on existing sites, and should also be used during the development workflow while building new sites. We use a world-class testing platform powered by WAVE, one of the most trusted web accessibility testing systems for over twenty years and whose results map to the WCAG 2.2 success criteria. WAVE is owned by WebAIM, which is part of the Institute for Disability Research, Policy & Practice at Utah State University – a recognized center of excellence when it comes to this space.

As powerful as automated testing is, there are significant limitations to relying solely upon it in order to meet WCAG 2.2 compliance:

• CONTEXTUAL UNDERSTANDING
  • Challenge: Automated tools typically can’t fully understand the context of how content is used or interpreted by real users, especially those with disabilities. Many WCAG success criteria require human judgment to determine whether the content is genuinely accessible. For example:
    • Understanding of content relationships: Determining whether headings are used in a logical and meaningful way or if navigation is intuitive often requires human evaluation.
    • Keyboard accessibility: Automated tools can check whether elements are focusable or not, but they can’t verify whether the interactive components are properly operable via keyboard (e.g., can the user interact with it meaningfully using only the keyboard?).

• COMPLEX INTERACTIONS
  • Challenge: Some WCAG success criteria focus on complex user interactions that might not be easily captured by automated tests:
    • Error prevention and recovery: Are users able to correct errors during form submission? Are they provided with helpful instructions in case of mistakes?
    • Dynamic content and AJAX updates: Automated tools can miss issues related to dynamically loaded content or real-time changes (e.g., missing live region updates for screen readers).
    • Multimedia content: Automated tools may not check whether audio and video content is appropriately captioned or transcribed, or whether sign language is used.

• SUBJECTIVE INTERPRETATION
  • Challenge: Some success criteria are subjective and require interpretation beyond the typical automation, based on the specific needs and goals of the users. For example:
    • Design: Is the site design sufficiently simple and predictable for people with cognitive disabilities? Are animations presented in a way that avoids causing seizures?

• NEW OR COMPLEX WCAG 2.2 SUCCESS CRITERIA
  • Challenge: The WCAG 2.2 update introduced some new success criteria that may require nuanced evaluation, such as:
    • Success Criterion 2.4.7 (Focus Visible): Is the focus visibly indicated and does it remain visible when expected across all interactive elements?
    • Success Criterion 2.5.7 (Target Size): Are the clickable target areas appropriately sized (especially in mobile environments)?

To achieve full WCAG 2.2 compliance and ensure a truly accessible user experience, brands should follow a comprehensive testing approach:

• AUTOMATED TESTING
  • Automated tools should be used for an initial audit to catch common issues quickly. Tools like WAVE, Axe, and Lighthouse can flag a wide range of WCAG violations and solving for these is a great step in the right direction.

• MANUAL TESTING
  • Manual inspection by human evaluators is necessary for areas that require human judgment, such as:
    • Ensuring logical document structure (headings, links, and forms)
    • Testing keyboard accessibility
    • Validating content relationships, especially in complex UIs.
    • Ensuring proper semantics in HTML
    • Ensuring intuitive navigation
    • Validating real-world usability with assistive technologies (e.g., screen readers, voice recognition)

• USER TESTING
  • Involving users with disabilities is the best way to uncover the most subtle and impactful barriers to accessibility. This deeper level of testing will ensure that your site works in real-world scenarios, where accessibility is not just about following guidelines, but about real users’ needs and experiences.