Most accessibility checklists are written for developers. They talk about ARIA roles, semantic landmarks and success criterion 1.4.11, and they assume you already know what a screen reader does. If you own a small business and just want to know whether your site is going to get you sued or lose you customers, that is not much help.
This website accessibility checklist is different. It is written for the person who paid for the site, not the person who built it. You can work through it yourself, on your own site, in about ninety minutes, using nothing but a browser and a keyboard. At the end you will have a list of problems you can hand to your developer, along with a rough sense of how urgent each one is.
Why This Matters (The Short Version)
Two reasons: legal exposure and lost revenue.
Legal. Accessibility is no longer a nice-to-have in most markets. In the European Union, the European Accessibility Act obligations became applicable in June 2025 and now cover e-commerce, banking, transport ticketing and a range of consumer-facing digital services. In the United States, the Department of Justice rule under Title II of the ADA set WCAG 2.1 Level AA as the technical standard for state and local government entities, with compliance dates falling in 2026 and 2027, and private businesses under Title III continue to face thousands of web accessibility lawsuits every year. The UK Equality Act 2010 and Canada’s Accessible Canada Act create similar duties. The common thread in nearly all of them is the same reference document: the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines, or WCAG, at Level AA.
Commercial. Roughly one in six people worldwide lives with a significant disability. Add temporary and situational limitations (a broken wrist, bright sunlight on a phone screen, a noisy train, a 62-year-old’s eyesight) and the number of people affected by a badly built site on any given day is far larger. Every one of these barriers is a person who wanted to buy from you and could not.
There is a third reason nobody mentions: almost everything on this list also improves your SEO. Headings, alt text, descriptive links and clean page titles are exactly what search engines parse.
How to Use This Checklist
- Pick your five most important pages: homepage, a service or product page, contact page, checkout or enquiry form, and your most-read blog post or FAQ.
- Work through the checklist below on each one.
- Mark each item Pass, Fail or Not sure.
- Send the Fail and Not sure items to your developer, quoting the item number.
You do not need to install anything. Two free browser tools will make it faster, though: WAVE (wave.webaim.org) and the Lighthouse panel that is already built into Chrome. Both catch a portion of issues automatically. Neither replaces the manual checks below, because roughly two thirds of accessibility problems can only be found by a human.
Section 1: Colour and Visual Design (Items 1 to 4)
1. Text has enough contrast against its background
What to check: Look at your body text, your button labels, your footer, and any text sitting on top of a photo or coloured banner. Light grey text on white is the single most common failure on small business websites, usually because a designer thought it looked elegant.
The rule: normal text needs a contrast ratio of at least 4.5:1. Large text (roughly 24px, or 19px if bold) needs 3:1.
How to test without technical skills: use the free WebAIM Contrast Checker, paste in your text colour and background colour hex codes (your developer or your brand guidelines will have them), and read the pass or fail result.
Why it matters: this is the most commonly cited issue in accessibility demand letters, and it affects anyone over 40 reading your site on a phone outdoors.
2. Colour is never the only way you communicate something
What to check: Do you have “required fields in red”? A pricing table where the recommended plan is only marked by a green border? A chart where the lines are distinguished purely by colour? Links inside paragraphs that are a different colour but not underlined?
The fix is usually trivial: add an asterisk, a label, a pattern, an icon, or an underline.
Why it matters: around 1 in 12 men has some form of colour vision deficiency. They are not a niche audience.
3. The site still works at 200% zoom
What to check: press Ctrl and + (Cmd and + on Mac) five or six times until the page is at 200%. Then read it. Does text overlap? Do buttons fall off the screen? Does a horizontal scrollbar appear that forces you to scroll left and right to read a sentence? Does a fixed header eat half the screen?
Why it matters: magnification is the single most used accessibility adjustment on the web, far more common than screen readers.
4. You can always see where you are when tabbing
What to check: click on the very top of a page, then press the Tab key repeatedly. A visible outline or highlight should move from link to link to button. If the outline disappears, or you cannot tell what is selected, you have a failure.
Common cause: a designer or theme added outline: none to the CSS because they thought the blue ring was ugly. This is one of the most damaging one-line decisions in web design.
Section 2: Images, Video and Media (Items 5 to 7)
5. Meaningful images have useful alt text
What to check: in WordPress, Shopify, Wix or Squarespace, open your media library or click each image and look at the “alternative text” field. Is it filled in? Is it actually descriptive?
| Image | Bad alt text | Good alt text |
|---|---|---|
| Photo of your team | IMG_4471.jpg | Our six-person team outside the Bristol workshop |
| Product shot | product image | Walnut dining chair with black steel legs, side view |
| Logo in header | logo | Peter Avey, home |
| Text inside a graphic | banner | The exact words shown in the graphic |
Rule of thumb: if you removed the image and the page lost meaning, describe it. Keep it under about 125 characters. Do not start with “image of”, the screen reader already announces that.
6. Decorative images are marked as decorative
What to check: background flourishes, dividers, abstract shapes and stock photos that add nothing should have an empty alt attribute, not a description. Most CMS platforms have a “mark as decorative” tick box.
Why it matters: a screen reader user forced to listen to “blue swirl graphic, blue swirl graphic, blue swirl graphic” will leave your site.
7. Video has captions and audio has a transcript
What to check: every embedded video with speech needs accurate captions. Auto-generated YouTube captions are a starting point but they are not compliant on their own because of accuracy and punctuation problems. Edit them. Podcasts and audio need a text transcript on the page.
Bonus: transcripts are indexable text, so this item pays for itself in search traffic.
Section 3: Structure and Navigation (Items 8 to 11)
8. Headings follow a logical order
What to check: every page should have exactly one H1 (the page title). Sub-sections use H2, sub-sections of those use H3, and so on. You should never jump from H2 to H4. And headings should never be chosen because of how big the text looks, which is the mistake almost every non-technical editor makes.
Quick test: install the free “HeadingsMap” browser extension, or simply read your page’s outline in the WordPress block editor’s document overview panel. If the outline reads like a sensible table of contents, you pass.
Why it matters: screen reader users navigate by jumping between headings the way sighted users skim. A broken heading structure means they have to listen to the whole page in order.
9. Link text makes sense on its own
What to check: scan your page for the words “click here”, “read more”, “learn more” and bare URLs. Assistive technology can list every link on a page in isolation. A list of fourteen links all saying “read more” is useless.
- Instead of: To see our pricing, click here.
- Write: See our pricing and packages.
Also flag any link that opens a PDF or a new window without warning you.
10. The entire site works with a keyboard only
This is the most revealing test on this list and it costs you nothing.
What to do: put your mouse to one side. Using only Tab, Shift+Tab, Enter, Space and the arrow keys, try to:
- Open your main navigation menu, including any dropdown submenus
- Reach and activate your primary call-to-action button
- Open and, crucially, close any popup, cookie banner or newsletter modal
- Complete your contact form and submit it
- Add an item to the cart and reach checkout, if you sell online
Red flags: focus getting trapped inside a popup with no way out, dropdown menus that only open on hover, a custom slider or date picker you cannot operate, or focus jumping to a strange place after you close something.
11. There is a “skip to main content” link
What to check: load your homepage, click at the very top, press Tab once. In a well-built site, a small link saying “Skip to content” appears. Without it, a keyboard user has to tab through your entire navigation menu on every single page. canada.ca goes into the numbers.
Section 4: Forms (Items 12 to 14)
Forms are where money changes hands, so failures here are the most expensive on your whole site.
12. Every field has a visible, permanent label
What to check: click into each field and start typing. Does the label disappear? Placeholder-only forms (where the grey text inside the box is the only label) fail on two counts: the text vanishes when you type, and placeholder grey usually fails contrast. Labels should sit above or beside the field and stay there.
Second test: click on the label text itself. In a correctly coded form, clicking the word “Email” puts the cursor into the email box. If nothing happens, the label is not properly connected and screen readers will not announce it.
13. Errors are explained in words, next to the problem
What to check: submit your form with deliberate mistakes: blank required fields, a malformed email address, a phone number with letters in it.
- Does an error message appear in text, not just a red border?
- Does it say what is wrong and how to fix it (“Enter a date in the format DD/MM/YYYY”) rather than just “Invalid”?
- Does the message sit next to the field that caused it?
- Is the user’s already-entered data preserved rather than wiped?
14. Nothing moves, autoplays or times out on you
What to check: carousels that rotate automatically, videos that play with sound on load, animated backgrounds, and session timeouts on booking or checkout pages. A comparable breakdown sits on a11yproject.com.
- Any motion lasting more than five seconds needs a visible pause control.
- Nothing should flash more than three times per second, ever.
- Time limits need a warning and an option to extend.
Why it matters: beyond compliance, auto-rotating hero sliders have measurably poor conversion rates. Removing one often improves both accessibility and sales.
Section 5: Content, Code Basics and Governance (Items 15 to 18)
15. Page titles and language are set correctly
What to check: look at your browser tab on each page. Does it say something unique and descriptive (“Contact Us | Peter Avey”) or does it say “Home” on all nine pages? Unique page titles are both an accessibility requirement and a basic ranking factor.
Language: your site needs to declare its language in the code so screen readers use the right pronunciation. Ask your developer to confirm the lang attribute is set. If you have pages in a second language, they need their own declaration.
16. Text is readable and written in plain language
- Body text at 16px minimum
- Paragraphs left-aligned, not justified (justified text creates rivers of white space that are hard to track)
- Short paragraphs, generous line spacing
- Expand acronyms the first time you use them
- Avoid idioms and heavy metaphor where a plain word will do
This item helps everyone: people with dyslexia, people with cognitive disabilities, non-native speakers, and anyone reading on a phone while distracted, which is most of your audience.
17. It works on a phone, including touch targets
What to check: open the site on an actual phone. Are buttons and links big enough to hit with a thumb (aim for at least 24 by 24 CSS pixels, ideally 44 by 44)? Are two links so close together that you keep tapping the wrong one? Does the site work in both portrait and landscape, since some users have their device fixed in a mount?
18. You have an accessibility statement and a way to report problems
What to check: do you have a page that states which standard you are working towards (WCAG 2.2 Level AA is the current benchmark), what you know is not yet fixed, and how someone can contact you if they hit a barrier?
Why it matters: in the EU this is a formal requirement for many organisations. Everywhere else, a dated, honest statement with a working contact route demonstrates good faith and is frequently the difference between a complaint that gets resolved by email and one that gets escalated.
Warning about overlays: the plugin widgets that promise “instant ADA compliance” for a monthly fee do not fix underlying code, are frequently detected and bypassed by screen reader users, and companies using them have still been sued. Treat them as a red flag, not a solution.
Priority Table: What to Fix First
| Priority | Checklist items | Typical effort |
|---|---|---|
| Critical (fix now) | 10 Keyboard access, 12 Form labels, 13 Error messages, 1 Contrast, 5 Alt text | Hours to a few days |
| High | 4 Focus indicator, 8 Headings, 9 Link text, 14 Motion and timeouts, 3 Zoom | Mostly quick CSS and content edits |
| Medium | 2 Colour dependence, 7 Captions, 11 Skip link, 15 Titles and language, 17 Touch targets | Ongoing content work |
| Governance | 6 Decorative images, 16 Plain language, 18 Accessibility statement | Policy and process |
What to Send Your Developer
A vague “can you make the site accessible” brief produces a vague quote. Instead, send something like this:
- The page URL for each failure
- The checklist item number from this article
- A screenshot or a one-line description of what you saw
- Your target: WCAG 2.2 Level AA
- A request that they retest with a real screen reader (NVDA on Windows or VoiceOver on Mac) rather than relying on automated scores alone
Ask for a fixed-price remediation on the critical items first, then a smaller retainer or an annual re-audit. Accessibility is not a one-time project, because every new blog post, product photo and landing page can reintroduce problems.
Keeping It Accessible After Launch
- Add alt text and heading checks to your content publishing routine. Two extra minutes per post.
- Run WAVE or Lighthouse on any new template before it goes live.
- Re-run this full 18-item checklist twice a year, and after any redesign or theme update.
- Test any new third-party tool (booking widget, chat bot, review plugin, payment embed) with the keyboard before you install it. Third-party embeds are the most common source of new failures on otherwise compliant sites.
Frequently Asked Questions
Which WCAG version should a small business aim for in 2026?
WCAG 2.2 at Level AA. It is the current W3C recommendation and is backward compatible with 2.1 AA, which is the version written into most current legislation. If you meet 2.2 AA, you meet 2.1 AA.
Can I just run an automated scan and be done?
No. Automated tools reliably catch around 30 to 40 percent of issues, mostly contrast and missing alt attributes. They cannot tell you whether your alt text is meaningful, whether your keyboard order makes sense, or whether your error messages are understandable. The manual checks in this list are the ones that matter most.
Do accessibility overlay widgets make my site compliant?
They do not. Overlays sit on top of existing code and cannot repair structural problems such as missing form labels or broken keyboard navigation. Numerous businesses using overlays have still received legal complaints, and many disabled users actively disable them. Fix the underlying site.
How much does it cost to fix a small business website?
For a brochure site of 10 to 20 pages built on a mainstream platform, the critical items on this list are usually a few days of developer time. Costs rise sharply for custom e-commerce, booking systems and interactive tools. Fixing issues before launch is dramatically cheaper than retrofitting later, which is the entire point of self-auditing now.
Does accessibility actually help SEO?
Yes, in overlapping areas. Descriptive alt text, logical heading hierarchy, unique page titles, meaningful link text, video transcripts and fast mobile-friendly layouts are all things search engines use. Accessibility work and technical SEO work are not the same job, but they share a lot of the same tasks.
My site is on Wix, Squarespace or Shopify. Am I covered?
Partly. Mainstream platforms have improved their core templates, but the accessibility of your specific site still depends on the theme you chose, the apps you installed, and the content you added. Every item on this checklist still applies to you.
Next Step
Work through the 18 items on your five key pages this week. Most business owners find between six and ten failures on a first pass, and roughly half of them are content fixes they can make themselves in an afternoon. The rest is a short, specific brief for a developer, which is a far better position than a vague worry about compliance.
This article is general guidance, not legal advice. Requirements vary by country, sector and organisation size. If you are unsure of your obligations, speak to a qualified adviser in your jurisdiction.