Accessibility Testing

Accessibility testing is a type of software testing that ensures that a product or service is accessible to people with disabilities. This includes people with visual impairments, hearing impairments, cognitive impairments, and mobility impairments. Accessibility testing is a subset of usability testing.

The goal of accessibility testing is to identify and address any barriers that may prevent people with disabilities from fully accessing and using the product or service. This can include things like:

• Text that is too small or too light to be read by people with low vision
• Audio that is too quiet or too distorted to be heard by people with hearing impairments
• Complex or confusing navigation that is difficult for people with cognitive impairments
• Pages that are not navigable by people using assistive technologies, such as screen readers or voice input

How do we test it and What are the guidelines need to follow ?

There are a number of different accessibility standards that can be used to guide accessibility testing. The most widely used standard is the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG). WCAG 2.1 defines three levels of accessibility: A, AA, and AAA. Level A is the minimum level of accessibility that is required by law in many countries. Level AA is a more rigorous standard that provides better accessibility for people with disabilities. Level AAA is the highest level of accessibility and is not required by law in most countries.

There are number of tools available in market to test the accessibility of the application for manual and as well as for automation.

Below are the few manual testing tools for Accessibility:

WAVE:? WAVE is a free online tool that can be used to scan websites and applications for accessibility issues. WAVE provides a detailed report of the accessibility issues that it finds, along with recommendations for how to fix them.

Accessibility Developer Tools:?The Accessibility Developer Tools are a set of tools that are built into most modern web browsers. These tools can be used to test the accessibility of websites and applications.

Quick Accessibility Page Tester:?Quick Accessibility Page Tester is a free online tool that can be used to test the accessibility of a single web page. Quick Accessibility Page Tester provides a quick overview of the accessibility issues that it finds.

As I said above there are number of tools available whose features are almost same. Apart from above tools following are other few tools which are open source : aDesigner, WebAnywhere, Web accessibility toolbar, TAW, etc..

You can select any of the tool available online but make sure it supports the accessibility standards which you want to follow.

What to test ?

Below steps will be useful if you don't want to rely on any automated tools:

1. Keyboard Accessibility: Testing whether all functionalities can be accessed and operated using a keyboard alone, without relying on a mouse or other pointing devices. For example using "tab" key to move forward or backward, enter to select or highlight specific frame to check whether interactive elements receive focus properly for users who rely on keyboard navigation.
2. Screen Reader Compatibility: Testing whether the product is compatible with screen reader software, enabling individuals with visual impairments to access the content through text-to-speech or Braille output. We can us JAWS tool where it reads the application. This will?ensure that all of the content is accessible to people who are blind or have low vision.
3. Alternative Text for Images: Testing whether images have appropriate alternative text descriptions to convey their meaning to individuals who cannot see them. This is one of the important test case while testing the accessibility as the alternate text will helpful to understand the image. This will?ensure that all of the content is accessible to people who are blind or have low vision.
4. Color Contrast: Testing whether there is sufficient contrast between text and background colors to ensure readability for individuals with visual impairments. Checking whether color contrasts are set according to the WCAG guidelines.

Benefits of Accessibility Testing

1. By making products and services more accessible, businesses can improve the user experience for everyone, including people with disabilities.
2. Businesses that make their products and services accessible can reach a wider range of customers, including people with disabilities.
3. Apart from market share we can actually achieve "Web For All" !!!

Accessibility testing can be Integrated with the existing selenium frameworks with the help of different libraries, well that can be done in separate article with code snippets.