In recent years, websites that work best with screen readers have been increasing in number. Once thought of as a niche or “niche market” within the Web accessibility world, this type of web design quickly becomes the standard for many sites.
Because of this increased presence and emphasis on website accessibility for people using assistive technologies, a lot has been written about how to make your website accessible. This article will focus on five different ways to check your website for accessibility.
5 Easy Ways to Check Website Accessibility
1. Zoom
According to AudioEye web accessibility checker, the number of websites that have a high-resolution graphical zoom option is growing. This accessibility feature can greatly enhance a blind or disabled person’s ability to navigate your website.
In addition to the optical zoom, the type of touch navigation used in Zoom can also be beneficial to a sighted person. A screen reader would read this different way if the web design were not accessible.
If you don’t have a high-resolution graphical zoom supported on your website, then that’s ok. Many good screen readers will allow users to zoom in and out of a web page by just using the keyboard.
2. Font Size
Font size issues can be the difference between an accessible and inaccessible website. Because of this, browser developers have implemented the property to give users control over the font size used to render text on the screen. To test this, I recommend using Chrome’s developer tools to measure font size at various zoom levels and compare these measurements with the expected values.
3. Page Margins
Depending on whether a user uses a screen reader, a keyboard, or a mouse to interact with the page, different page margins can impact text readability on a website. By adding test page margins in your developer tools’ setup area, you can check to see if these values are correct by looking at how text appears when you move your mouse over certain areas of the screen.
4. View Source
View Source is the best way to examine text-only content on a website. AudioEye’s Testing Center gives you the ability to check your website’s text-only accessibility with your screen reader of choice. If you’re unable to see the content of the webpage using the screen reader, you know that there is a problem with how it is currently coded.
5. Color Scheme
Color selection for your website can have a significant impact on its accessibility. There are several different color schemes out there, and not all of them are created equal. AudioEye has a tool specifically for checking the accessibility of color schemes, which you can use to see if the colors being used on your site are accessible.
If you have any questions about these five ways to check website accessibility, feel free to ask in our discussion forum. We also have many other articles on web accessibility, online accessibility training, and web accessibility articles.
There are many different ways that you can check website accessibility. All of them are important, and you need to take the time to check the accessibility of your site and make sure it makes sense to screen readers and keyboard users. It is in your best interest to make sure your website is accessible. Your users will thank you for it.