There are many new and existing automated scanning tools for accessibility. Some of them, like SiteImprove and Adobe Acrobat, may be tools you currently use. Automated scanners can provide helpful information, but they still lack an essential component: You!

Automated scanning tools do not have perspective or empathy, which can lead to content that is completely inaccessible even if a scan’s reports claim otherwise. Still, if used correctly, these tools can be an essential part of your accessibility workflow. Below is what you should know about automated testing, and some tips for reviewing content manually.

Automated scans won't check everything

Some automated scanners have been found to check for about 30 percent of the compliance standards in the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines. According to Accessibility.com, this is “… because automated tests lack the kind of user perspective that a real person can offer. A real person will have a nuanced experience of interacting with a site that software won’t be able to reflect in its evaluation.”

An example of this can be found in how Adobe Acrobat can’t tell you whether the reading order of a PDF is correct, or if a document should or should not include a heading structure (spoiler: every PDF should have tagged headings!).

Automated scans can’t offer opinions

Automated scanners are great at identifying issues like if an image has alternative text, but it can’t provide an opinion on the accuracy of alt text. While it’s true that companies like Facebook and others use A.I. tools to describe images and offer opinions on content, they still have a long way to go. Take for example this alternative text an A.I. tool generated for a headshot of Interim President Richard Bierschbach:

“Portrait orientation photograph headshot close-up view of Richard A. Bierschbach, a smiling man with short dark brown hair and tortoiseshell-style design mixture color (dark brown color shades) prescription eyeglasses as he is wearing a dark navy blue colored business suit blazer jacket, a light sky blue colored button-up dress shirt underneath, and a patterned dark gray colored tie equipped”

This alternative text is poorly written, too long, and would be considerably disorienting too anyone who listened to it in the flow of content. A better alternative to this could be something succinct like, "Interim president Richard Bierschbach." Of course, alternative text is often decided by context and what an image conveys on a page. You can learn more about writing alternative text here.

Tools to check content manually

It may seem daunting to manually check content, and certainly there are situations where you should have an expert review content. However, there are a lot of benefits to reviewing things yourself to better understand how people process information.

Browser extensions like WAVE and ANDI can help you identify things like heading structure, review alternative text, and a page's reading order. Free screen readers like Apple Voiceover and NVDA can help you hear a full page to see if anything sounds off. A revealing test can even be as simple as trying to navigate your content with just a keyboard!

There is a lot to learn here, so if any questions come up, please reach out to accessibility@wayne.edu.

Average accessibility scores across wayne.edu sites

Captured below is a month-to-month snapshot of the average accessibility scores on wayne.edu sites. Our numbers stayed nearly the same as the last month, staying at 92.5%. The good news is that we have many site-wide fixes coming soon to keep these numbers moving up!