Tips for improving the accessibility of your site

With assistive technology such as screen readers relying on recognising the HTML used, the key to creating accessible websites is to use valid HTML. The additional benefits are:

Your website is easier to manage
Accessible websites split the content and layout of each page using Cascading Style Sheets (CSS). The CSS file covers the layout for the site, so to alter the look of the whole site only one file needs to be modified.
Your website will appear higher in search engines
Search engines cannot usually understand images, audio and video content. By providing alternative content to each of these, all areas of your website will be accessible to search engines, who'll then be able to have a better understanding of its purpose, giving it a higher place in the search engine rankings.

To make your website more accessible:

Don't stop users from changing the text size.
Some users adjust their browser settings to increase the font size. This might affect the layout you have designed. Additionally graphical menus will not be affected, so users may not be able to read them - always include a text description.
Don't "lock-down" the colours used.
Some users adjust their browser settings to select colour combinations that they find easiest to read.
Associate text descriptions to images and animations.
Blind users may have screen reader software to convert what is on the screen to either speech or into Braille. Screen readers and Braille displays only work with text, and can't interpret images or animations.
Don't use colour as the only means of providing a piece of information.
For example someone using a screen reader or who is colour blind won't spot if you are using a green button for go and red for stop.
Keep layout consistent around the site.
This helps navigation around your pages as users know where to find links etc.
Include a transcript of audio tracks containing speech and a description for other audio tracks such as sounds or music, for deaf and hard of hearing users.
Keep text simple.
For sign language users, English is a second language and they may have difficulty understanding long, complex sentences. This will also help other users who have English as their second language and users with learning difficulties such as dyslexia. For more information see our section on improving readability.
Don't assume everyone uses a mouse.
This can affect the use of elements such as hover text, rollovers and dropdown menus. You can test a page for use without a mouse quite easily. Use the TAB key to move between links. Pressing the ENTER key is equivalent to clicking a mouse

If you have any other tips that you think others might find useful, please pass them on.

Want to know more?

WAI website
The Web Accessibility Initiative (WAI) produce the definitive guidelines for producing accessible websites.

Our web accessibility links
A list of other useful sites.

About this site section
How we have made this site accessible