{"id":11932,"date":"2025-04-10T15:52:23","date_gmt":"2025-04-10T15:52:23","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.uxdesigninstitute.com\/blog\/?p=11932"},"modified":"2025-10-24T13:09:14","modified_gmt":"2025-10-24T12:09:14","slug":"what-is-accessible-design","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.uxdesigninstitute.com\/blog\/what-is-accessible-design\/","title":{"rendered":"What is accessible design and why it matters"},"content":{"rendered":"

One of the things you may not think about when you design a website, app, or other digital product is how you can be sure that <\/span>everybody<\/span><\/i> can use it. That\u2019s what we mean by accessibility. Designing for accessibility is designing for everyone, including those with disabilities. Accessible design means enhancing the user experience for a broad audience while ensuring that the design is inclusive.<\/span><\/p>\n\n

What is accessible design?<\/strong><\/h2>\n

Accessible design means making the web better for every user. While meeting the needs of people with disabilities is central to accessibility, it ultimately refers to making websites, apps, services, and products usable to people of all capabilities, no matter their issues. This may mean having different ways for people with different capabilities to use your product. For example, some people may encounter your product while using an assistive device, and while their experience will be different, it shouldn\u2019t be in any way inferior to those who can access your product without one.<\/span><\/p>\n

Accessibility and usability are both considered important parts of UX design. Accessibility is often considered part of usability because usability is about making an experience engaging, effective, and easy to use. However, the reality is that while accessibility and usability overlap, their focus is different. Usability doesn\u2019t focus on people with disabilities, while accessible design does. So while we talk a lot about usability in UX, it\u2019s important we talk about accessibility as well.<\/span><\/p>\n

Types of accessibility issues<\/strong><\/h2>\n

According to the <\/span>World Health Organization<\/span><\/a>, approximately 16% of the global population has a disability. That\u2019s over 1 billion people around the world, and yet few organisations ensure that everything they do is optimized for people of all abilities. Here are the most common disabilities:<\/span><\/p>\n

Visual\u00a0<\/strong><\/h4>\n

People with visual disabilities can have all kinds of impairments. Besides total blindness, there\u2019s partial blindness, color blindness, scratches on the cornea or sclera, diabetes-related eye conditions, corneal grafts, and even dry eyes.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Auditory<\/strong><\/h4>\n

Auditory disabilities, or hearing issues, can encompass being completely or partially deaf. Those who are deaf use sign language to communicate, but anyone with hearing loss can have an auditory disability.<\/span><\/p>\n

Learning and cognitive<\/strong><\/h4>\n

This encompasses everything from speech disorders to learning difficulties like dyslexia. These disabilities can impact a person\u2019s ability to reason, plan, and comprehend.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Motor<\/strong><\/h4>\n

Motor or mobility disabilities impact a person\u2019s physical capabilities. They can impact upper or lower limbs, dexterity in the fingers, or organs in the body and can be the result of a condition from birth or of age or disease.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

While these are the types of disabilities you may encounter most often, they don\u2019t cover all the different kinds of barriers to accessibility. There are even issues that can arise for any user. For example, if you\u2019re sleep deprived, you may have trouble focusing and using a phone, tablet, or computer as efficiently. And if you have allergies, you may find on some days you can\u2019t see as well as you usually do, compromising your ability to use technology. More generally, you might find your ability to access the internet via your mobile device is compromised if you try to use it underground, for example, on the subway.<\/span><\/p>\n

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What are the four principles of accessible design?<\/strong><\/h2>\n

The World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) has laid out four principles for accessible design in the <\/span>Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG)<\/span><\/a>, the globally recognised standard for digital accessibility. It says that content should be:<\/span><\/p>\n

Perceivable<\/strong><\/h4>\n

Content or information should be presented to users in a way that they can perceive with at least one of their senses. For example, non-text alternatives should be provided for people who have a visual impairment. These can include braille, speech, symbols, or even larger print or simpler language. And for people who have trouble seeing non-text content, alternatives like closed captions or alt tags should be provided.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Operable<\/strong><\/h4>\n

Navigation and other user interface components must be operable regardless of a person\u2019s physical condition. So a website that can only be operated via a mouse, for example, would not work for many people. Websites, apps, and other products must be fully accessible via other means, such as keyboard or a pointer. In addition, users should have ample time to use content, including those with learning disabilities, and products must not contain anything that flashes more than three times in one second to avoid inducing seizures<\/span><\/p>\n

Understandable<\/strong><\/h4>\n

Content must be presented in a way that\u2019s simple and easy to understand. Users, including those with learning or cognitive disabilities, shouldn\u2019t have trouble comprehending the information on a product. For example, the language of a product must be able to be determined by the code of the product so screen readers can understand and pronounce words correctly.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Robust<\/strong><\/h4>\n

The content of a product must be able to be interpreted by assistive technologies and other user agents. This can be done by using code that is written according to recognised standards. For example, screen readers should be able to announce changes in status updates, such as an \u201citem added to cart\u201d alert when a user has added a piece of clothing, a toy, or anything else to their cart.\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Six elements for accessible design<\/strong><\/h2>\n

Certain elements are especially important for accessible design. While these elements won\u2019t solve all a product\u2019s accessibility problems, they help immensely. Not only that, these elements improve the user experience for everyone. Here are those elements:<\/span><\/p>\n

Alt text<\/strong><\/h4>\n

There should be alternative text for images, providing a way for people with vision impairments to understand the content in the images.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Alternate descriptions for videos<\/strong><\/h4>\n

To make video content accessible to people with visual or hearing impairments, videos should provide audio descriptions for visual content and text captions for spoken content, respectively.<\/span><\/p>\n

High colour contrast<\/strong><\/h4>\n

To ensure readability for people, especially those with color blindness and other vision impairments, there should be adequate contrast between text and background colors and between elements like buttons and their background colors.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Support for keyboard shortcuts<\/strong><\/h4>\n

Keyboard shortcuts should be enabled for people with mobility issues and everyone else who prefers using the keyboard over a mouse or touchscreen when navigating a product.<\/span><\/p>\n

Compatibility with assistive technology<\/strong><\/h4>\n

Products should work with assistive technologies like screen readers, voice control software, and magnifiers.<\/span><\/p>\n

Resizable text<\/strong><\/h4>\n

Text should be able to be made larger with no loss of content or functionality.<\/span><\/p>\n

Why accessible design matters<\/strong><\/h2>\n

While it\u2019s been stated in different ways throughout this article, it\u2019s important to remember that accessible design matters because it helps all users. All users can benefit from products that are made for accessibility, not to mention that when designers create products with accessibility in mind, they frequently design better products for everyone.<\/span><\/p>\n

In addition, there is an urgency to understanding accessibility in regions like the European Union, where the European Accessibility Act (EAA) will be fully enforced in June 2025. The EAA covers companies within the EU and companies working with the EU. Therefore, product and design teams across the world, with exposure to the EU, will have to know how to design for accessibility to be compliant with the law.\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Other important benefits<\/strong><\/h4>\n

There are additional benefits, too. These include:<\/span><\/p>\n