Links on this page that end with an asterisk (*) will take you to our glossary. Use your browser's Back button to get back to this page.
The most effective way to ensure your website is accessible is to build continuous testing into the project, from the wireframes and design to the finished product.
There are three types of testing you can carry out on your site, each with its strengths and weaknesses. We'd recommend you use them all if possible, and at the very least a combination of automated and manual testing.
Automated testing
Automated testing tools are online services or software applications that examine the code (HTML, CSS, JavaScript etc) in a page or website for compliance with a particular standard, e.g. WCAG*. There are some free services that usually examine a single page or a small number of pages, but most of the services that cover complete websites come with a price tag.
Strengths
Some of the issues that automated testing is good at picking up are:
-
Links opening in new windows
-
missing or non unique page titles
-
Incorrect heading structure
-
Form fields without explicitly associated labels
-
Linked images with empty ALT attributes
-
Tables with incorrect structure or without TH headings
-
Invalid HTML or CSS
-
Broken links
some automatic tools are even able to highlight potential failures that will need further manual inspection, like:
-
"Click here" or similar non meaningful links
-
Potentially invalid ALT attributes such as place holder text (e.g. "image1" or "spacer" or "Insert alt text here")
-
The presence of JavaScript events that could lead to accessibility issues
Weaknesses
Automated testing won't identify issues such as:
-
Images with incorrect information in the ALT attribute or images of text whose alt text is different from what's written on the image
-
Headings that are structurally perfect but aren't correctly used, such as where the H1 heading precedes navigation rather than main content
-
Confusing navigation structure
-
Links that don't describe their destination or make sense out of context, unless they are obvious, for example "Click here"
-
Page titles that don't give an accurate or adequate description of content.
-
Poor colour contrast, especially within images
-
Where only visual clues such as colour or font style are used to flag up important information.
-
JavaScript that's used incorrectly, for example if there's a keyboard trap or a pseudo button that isn't keyboard or screen reader accessible.
Testing tools
A web search will bring up a host of automated testing tools, all of which will provide slightly different results based on the programmer's interpretation of the criteria you're testing against such as WCAG. Here are just a few:
Manual testing
This is testing that's carried out manually, either by testers from your own organisation or by experts like ourselves, who can put your site through its paces using a variety of browsers and access technologies*. After the testing they'll usually provide you with a comprehensive report explaining the issues they found, which user groups they're likely to affect and in what way, and pointers on how to fix them.
We offer a range of consultancy services and web accessibility training courses. Feel free to get in touch if you'd like more information.
Testing tools
There's a plethora of testing tools out there that'll help you with your manual testing. Some of the most popular are:
User testing
This is a set of task-based tests carried out on your site by a group of users with a range of accessibility needs, who aren't familiar with the site. If you can build user testing into the project at key stages during its lifecycle, this is the best way to discover what does and doesn't work in a "real life" situation.
We offer a Surf Right with Useability audit - feel free to get in touch if you'd like more information.