WCAG Compliance

Jim and his team have spent months designing a new website. They’ve put all their creativity and technical skills into making it visually appealing, easy to navigate, and ready to launch. The team believes they’ve thought of everything – from user engagement to simple navigation. 

However, just before the launch, Jim realizes his sister Jane wouldn’t be able to use it. Jane has a visual impairment and requires a screen reader. Jim’s team accidentally overlooked a critical aspect of their design: accessibility for people with disabilities. 

After realizing their mistake, the team added alt texts for images, full transcripts for audio content, and real-time captions for video materials. They also ensured their website could be navigated only using a keyboard for those unable to use a mouse or touchpad due to a physical impairment, and refined their HTML structure so tools such as screen readers could properly interpret the website.

To prevent designers like Jim from accidentally missing this step, the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) created the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG). These universally accepted guidelines cover disabilities such as visual, auditory, sensory, speech, physical, cognitive, linguistic, learning, and neurological impairments.¹ They have also been incorporated into regional and national legislations such as the Americans with Disabilities Act and the Accessibility for Ontarians with Disabilities Act.²

WCAG compliance isn’t just about avoiding legal repercussions. It ensures inclusivity and that everyone can access, understand, and interact with web content. Being compliant with WCAG also benefits your product and company as it widens your target population and enhances your website’s user experience.

WCAG Principles

The WCAG standards ensure web accessibility through four main principles:³

• Perceivable: Information should not require the use of all senses to be understood. To achieve this, some useful tools include providing captions for audio, descriptions for videos, proper color contrast, and text resizing without compromising content or functionality.
• Operable: Websites must be navigable and usable for everyone. For example, they should ensure keyboard-only navigation, using proper titles, and making hyperlinks clear from the text alone.
• Understandable: The purpose of the website should be easy to comprehend. This means making sure the website tells you what language it's in, giving labels for places where you need to enter information, and keeping the way you move around the site consistent on every page.
• Robust: The website’s content should be accessible on all types of electronic devices including screen readers. To achieve this, designers can organize websites so that all content can be identified by assistive technology.

Following these four principles makes websites accessible to individuals with various disabilities, ensuring full and equal participation in the digital world.