Why is accessibility important in web design?

£274 billion is a big number. Even without that, making your website accessible is good practise. It helps make the user experience better which benefits everyone. And in the era of core web vitals, that includes Google.

What are accessibility issues in website design?

Accessibility issues are often thought about in relation to disabilities.

For example, someone with blindness or low vision may rely on software called a screen reader. A screen reader is a type of assistive technology, a term you'll see a lot when dealing with accessibility. The screen reader software helps people navigate websites by reading the content aloud. This removes the need for a mouse and relying on visual cues.

Someone with limited motor control may find a mouse hard to use. Or maybe their Apple mouse is out of action while it’s on charge. So, they might navigate with their keyboard. You can try this – visit your favourite website and use the tab key, arrow keys and return key to navigate. Now try again on gov.uk – you should notice the difference.

Let’s take the above examples without disabilities in mind. Vision often starts to deteriorate after age 40 due to presbyopia. The predicated median age of the UK population in 2025 will be 40.5. I'm living proof – I've had to start wearing glasses since I first wrote this article. So, basic accessibility considerations like making text easy to zoom will help a lot of people (WCAG 1.4.4).

And have you ever had a few too many beers, hit a workout a bit hard? Then you will have experienced loss of fine motor control. Big, clear buttons make it a lot easier to order that recovery takeaway from your phone (WCAG 2.5.5).

How do you define accessibility standards for websites?

A set of guidelines called WCAG govern web design accessibility standards. WCAG stands for web content accessibility guidelines, the current version is WCAG 2.2. 

There are three levels of accessibility in WCAG from Level A to Level AAA. Each level builds on the previous, so to meet Level AA, your website must meet Level A first. 

In broad terms, the more “A”s you need, the greater the impact on design. That’s not to say accessible websites can’t be beautifully designed, there are just more considerations.

WCAG Level A

• Level A is the broadest in scope. Meeting these guidelines should make your website accessible to many people. This level has minimal impact on design and structure.

WCAG Level AA

• Level AA makes your website useable by most people, with or without disabilities. This level is the standard used by many organisations around the world. For most websites, Level AA is a great target. 

WCAG Level AAA

• Level AAA is the most strict level. Designed to make your website accessible to almost everyone. This level has a high impact on design and isn't suitable for many sites. This is because some types of content can never meet the guidelines.

Is web accessibility a legal requirement in the UK?

As of Sept 2018 all UK public sector websites are required to meet the  WCAG 2.2 AA standard. 

For B2B websites, the European Accessibility Act (EAA) came into force in June 2025. It applies to businesses selling products or services in the EU, regardless of where they are based. If your customers include people in Europe, this probably applies to you.

We don’t have any requirements for commercial websites in the UK, yet. But making your website more accessible is best practise, you shouldn’t need to wait until a law forces your hand.

How do I make my website accessible?

The short answer is to work through the WCAG guidelines and resolve any issues. WCAG is very technical and can be hard to understand. WebAIM have created a version that's easier to follow – the WebAIM WCAG2 checklist. This does not replace the WCAG list, it's designed to make it easier to work with.

You can use the list to produce an accessibility audit. Check off each point to see if your website meets that guideline. If it doesn’t, make a note of why. This will give you a list of things that need fixing. Most websites have several templates and elements so be sure to test a variety of pages.

Automated tools such as axe Devtools, SortSite, and Lighthouse (built into Google Chrome) can spot some issues. But, it's estimated that tools only catch 20-40% (based on this report from Test Guild).

This means that 60-80% require manual checks, and the WCAG guidelines are quite technical so you’ll need a strong understanding of websites as well as the guidelines and how to test against them.

How will people know where to click?

This often comes up  when we don’t have “click here” and “read more” links in designs.

The solution is to make the link look like a link, with an underline, or an arrow. Make buttons look like buttons, (but not ghost buttons). People are quite used to poking at things that look like they can be poked. Consider your phone, your computer, ATMs. None of them tell you to click here, the labels are the instructions.

Documents

Everyone forgets documents. All those PDF and Word files are part of your website too. We almost always find these three things:

• Missing alt text (WCAG 1.1.1 – Non text content)
• Language setting (WCAG 3.1.1 – Language of page)
• Missing page titles (WCAG 2.4.2 – Page titled)

Fixing PDFs is quite simple with Acrobat Pro using the built-in accessibility tools. Microsoft have resources for making accessible Word Documents too.

More complex documents with tables, lists and links may need extra work. There is a good guide on AbilityNet for creating accessible documents.

If you create a lot of documents you likely need a specialist to produce them or at least set up templates, and PDF/UA (the standard for accessible PDFs) is worth reading up on.

If you are a public sector body, only documents published after 23 September 2018 need to comply. Unless the document is still relevant, such as a manual for a currently used system.

Note on accessible documents

Documents can be hard to make accessible. At the time of writing this website falls short of Level AA because of the forms in our web design brief. This is not ideal, but the document is still useful without needing to use the form.

You can cover any issues like this in an accessibility statement.

Should I use an accessibility overlay?

You may have seen accessibility overlays on websites. They usually open a menu with options to make the website easier to use, such as large text or high contrast.

While this sounds like a good idea on paper, a well designed and built website does not need it. The users browser and, if they have it, specialist software will do all these things. So an overlay on an inaccessible website becomes a crutch rather than addressing underlying issues. That’s not to say they don’t have a place, just for most sites they won’t bring much to the table.

The European Disability Forum (EDF) and the International Association of Accessibility Professionals (IAAP) agree in their statement from May 2023: Does accessibility overlay technology live up to the hype?

How do I write an accessibility statement?

You can use your accessibility audit to write your accessibility statement. It’s ok if your website doesn’t pass everything, the statement will cover that.

The gov.uk website has a sample accessibility statement that you can work from. This page has very clear instructions and is easy to follow. If you are a public sector body, note that some of the wording is required by law.

One important bit is the “non-accessible content” section. If your accessibility audit found issues, you can explain these issues here, and how you plan to fix them. Then as you work through the issues, re-test your website and update your statement.

Disproportionate burden

What if you can’t fix something? Or don’t have the time or budget right now? You can flag issues as a disproportionate burden. This is not an excuse to ignore issues, some things are just not practical. Any new website should aim to not include disproportionate burdens. It is sometimes necessary though, for example if you rely on legacy content such as old documents.

What next?

I hope you've learned a bit about why accessibility matters and how to start looking into it. An accessibility audit is the best starting point. Then review your website regularly as developments and new content could reintroduce issues. Your accessibility statement should have a “last amended” date to show it is up to date. 

Planning a new website? If you are it's a good idea to include accessibility into your brief. Find out how to write a website brief and download our free website brief template to help you get started.

If you want to redesign your B2B website to make it accessible then we recommend finding a B2B web design agency that is experienced in accessible design. 

Would you like to know more about accessible web design? If you have questions or would like an accessibility audit, please feel free to email me