WCAG Explained

What is WCAG

WCAG stands for Web Content Accessibility Guidelines. These guidelines are developed by the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) to make web content more accessible to people with disabilities. They are essential for ensuring that everyone, regardless of their abilities, can access and interact with your website.

Why is WCAG Important?

Accessibility is not just a legal requirement; it’s a moral obligation. Ensuring your website adheres to WCAG:

Expands Your Audience:

Accessible websites reach a wider audience, including people with disabilities.

Enhances SEO:

Many accessibility practices also improve search engine optimisation.

Improves Usability:

Accessible design often enhances the overall user experience.

Reduces Legal Risks:

Compliance with accessibility laws and regulations protects your business from legal action.

WCAG Principles

WCAG is built on four main principles, often abbreviated as POUR

1. Perceivable

Content must be presented in ways that users can perceive. This includes providing text alternatives for non-text content, creating adaptable content, and ensuring users can see and hear the content.

2. Operable

User interface components and navigation must be operable. This means making all functionality available from a keyboard, giving users enough time to read and use content, and not designing content in a way that is known to cause seizures.

3. Understandable

Information and the operation of the user interface must be understandable. This involves making text readable and understandable, ensuring web pages appear and operate in predictable ways, and helping users avoid and correct mistakes.

4. Robust

Content must be robust enough to be interpreted reliably by a wide variety of user agents, including assistive technologies. This means using clean and consistent HTML code that can be reliably processed by current and future user tools.

WCAG Levels of Compliance

WCAG defines three levels of compliance:

Level A (Minimum):

The most basic web accessibility features. Websites must meet these requirements to ensure that no barriers exist that make the website unusable for people with disabilities.

Level AA (Mid Range):

Deals with the biggest and most common barriers for disabled users. This is the level most organisations aim to meet.

Level AAA (Highest):

The highest and most complex level of web accessibility. It is not always possible to meet this level for all content.

How to Implement WCAG

WCAG is built on four main principles, often abbreviated as POUR:

1. Understand the Guidelines

Familiarise yourself with the full WCAG documentation. The guidelines are extensive, but understanding them is crucial.

2. Conduct an Accessibility Audit

Perform an audit of your current website to identify areas that need improvement. Tools like WAVE or Axe can help you get started.

3. Make Necessary Changes

Based on the audit results, update your website's design and content to meet WCAG standards. This may involve adding alt text to images, ensuring sufficient colour contrast, and improving keyboard navigation.

4. Test with Real Users

Conduct usability testing with people who have disabilities. Their feedback is invaluable in understanding the real-world accessibility of your website.

5. Stay Updated

Accessibility is an ongoing process. Keep yourself updated with the latest developments in WCAG and continue to make improvements.