What are the most important accessibility guidelines for usability testing?

1 Why accessibility matters

Accessibility is the practice of designing and developing products or services that are accessible to everyone, regardless of their abilities, disabilities, or assistive technologies. Accessibility is not only a legal requirement, but also a moral and business responsibility. By making your product or service accessible, you can reach a wider and more diverse audience, enhance your reputation, and avoid potential lawsuits or penalties. Moreover, accessibility can improve the overall usability and quality of your product or service, as it often leads to simpler, clearer, and more consistent design and development.

2 How to plan for accessibility

Before you conduct usability testing for accessibility, you need to plan ahead and define your goals, scope, and criteria. You should also decide who will participate in the testing, how you will recruit and screen them, and what incentives you will offer. Ideally, you should include users with different abilities, disabilities, and assistive technologies, as well as users without any accessibility needs. You should also consider the diversity of your users in terms of age, gender, culture, and language. Additionally, you should determine what tasks and scenarios you will test, what methods and tools you will use, and how you will measure and report the results.

3 What to test for accessibility

When you conduct usability testing for accessibility, you should test both the functional and the experiential aspects of your product or service. Functional aspects include the technical and design features that enable users to access and use your product or service, such as keyboard navigation, screen reader compatibility, color contrast, text size, captions, and labels. Experiential aspects include the emotional and cognitive responses that users have when interacting with your product or service, such as satisfaction, frustration, confidence, and engagement. You should test both aspects across different devices, platforms, browsers, and environments.

4 How to test for accessibility

Testing for accessibility can be done in a variety of ways, depending on your resources, time, and objectives. Heuristic evaluation is one method that involves quickly checking your product or service against a set of accessibility principles or guidelines. An expert can be hired to do this or it can be done independently. Automated testing is another option which involves scanning your product or service for common accessibility errors using online tools or software such as WAVE, Axe, or Lighthouse. Finally, user testing is a great way to observe and interview real users with different abilities, disabilities, and assistive technologies to collect their feedback and suggestions. This can be done in person or remotely with techniques and tools such as think aloud, eye tracking, surveys, or screen recording.

5 How to improve for accessibility

After you conduct usability testing for accessibility, you should analyze and prioritize the findings, and implement the necessary changes and improvements. You should also document and communicate the results and recommendations to your team, stakeholders, and users. Furthermore, you should monitor and evaluate the impact and effectiveness of your actions, and conduct follow-up testing if needed. You should also keep up to date with the latest accessibility standards, trends, and best practices, and adopt a continuous improvement mindset.

6 Here’s what else to consider

This is a space to share examples, stories, or insights that don’t fit into any of the previous sections. What else would you like to add?