Accessibility Principles & Criteria

Accessibility Principles & Criteria

Digital accessibility is a way of designing content, websites, tools, and technologies so that everyone can use them easily. The Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) cover recommendations to make websites more accessible to people with disabilities. The guidelines are inspired by four principles and organized into success criteria.

Accessibility Principles

The four accessibility principles lay the foundation necessary for anyone to access web content. In that way, content must be:

  • Perceivable: information and user interface components must be presentable to users in ways they can perceive​
  • Operable: user interface components and navigation must be operable​
  • Understandable: information and the operation of user interface must be understandable​
  • Robust: content must be robust enough that it can be interpreted reliably by a wide variety of user agents, including assistive technologies​

Basic Accessibility Criteria

The Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) are organized in 12 guidelines, and many success criteria. According to your field of work, some criteria might be more relevant than others. An example of a basic accessibility criteria list that one could curate is as follows:

Perceivable 🔍
Operable 💻
Understandable 💡
Provide alternative text for images
Ensure everything works for keyboard-only users
Use simple language
Provide captions for videos
Avoid blinking, fast-moving or flashing content
Keep sentences short
Use text colors that show up clearly against the background
Use descriptive links so users know where a link will take them
Avoid acronyms or phrases that users wouldn’t recognize
Avoid using sensory information (e.g. color) as the only way to convey a message
For keyboard users, elements (e.g. text) should follow a logical order
Make sure design features look consistent and behave in predictable ways​

The Web Accessibility Initiative website provides a quick reference of the full list of criteria and techniques.

Additional Resources

“Doing a basic accessibility check if you cannot do a detailed one” by the United Kingdom’s Digital and Data OfficeDownload
“How to make your online content accessible” by Digital Culture NetworkDownload

Sources