An accessible website: what is now required and how to get there
Since June 2025 an accessibility obligation has applied across the EU to a large share of digitally offered products and services. For most business websites that means less work than feared — ten measures cover the bulk of it.
In short
- In the EU the obligation applies mainly to providers selling digitally to consumers — purely business-to-business offerings and micro-enterprises are partly exempt.
- The standard is WCAG at level AA. That sounds like a lot; for an ordinary business site it is reachable in a few days.
- Ten measures cover most of it — and most of them are good practice anyway.
- Automated checking tools find only part of the problems. The rest needs a test with the keyboard and a screen reader.
Who it applies to
Since 28 June 2025 the European Accessibility Act has applied across the EU, transposed into national law. It covers digitally offered products and services for consumers.
| Case | Covered? |
|---|---|
| Online shop for consumers | yes |
| Booking or appointment flow for consumers | yes |
| Purely business-to-business services | generally not |
| Purely informational site with no selling | generally not |
| Micro-enterprises providing services | partly exempt |
| Public bodies | yes, already before this |
In Switzerland the Disability Discrimination Act applies and obliges mainly public bodies. But anyone supplying consumers in the EU falls under the EU rules for that offering — so the question arises for Swiss companies with EU business too.
The ten measures
Sorted by effect per effort. The first five typically cover most of the findings.
1. Alt text for images
Describe what the image means in context — not what can be seen in it. Purely decorative images get an empty attribute so they are skipped.
2. Check contrast
At least 4.5:1 for normal text, 3:1 for large. This particularly affects grey helper text and light labels on coloured surfaces.
3. Everything reachable by keyboard
Every function has to work without a mouse, in a sensible order, with no place you get stuck. This mainly affects menus, overlays and forms.
4. Visible focus
Where is the keyboard focus right now? A clearly visible outline. The most common fault is an outline: none in the stylesheet that was never replaced.
5. Labelled form fields
Every field needs an associated label. Placeholder text is not enough — it disappears on typing and is not read out everywhere.
6. Headings in order
One H1, H2s below it, H3s below those — no skipping. Screen readers navigate by them; a page without structure cannot be skimmed.
7. Mark up the language
<html lang> per version, foreign-language passages marked individually. Without it, text gets read out with the wrong pronunciation.
8. Meaningful link text
"Learn more" five times on one page is useless when links get read out individually. The link text has to make sense on its own.
9. Zoom to 200 per cent
Nothing may get cut off or disappear when enlarging. This mainly affects fixed heights and overlays.
10. Error messages as text
A red outline is not enough — the error has to appear as text alongside and say what to do. Colour alone must never be the only carrier of information.
Worth knowing
Nine of the ten measures simultaneously improve findability. Heading hierarchy, alt text, meaningful link text and marked-up language are the same things search engines and answer engines need.
That is no coincidence: a screen reader and a crawler face the same problem — they do not see the page, they read its structure. Build for one and you have largely handled the other.
Checking — and what tools cannot find
Automated checking tools find, by common estimates, only part of the actual problems. What they reliably find: missing alt text, insufficient contrast, missing field labels, language markup.
What they cannot find:
- Whether an alt text is meaningful. "image1.jpg" passes the check.
- Whether the keyboard order is logical. Present yes, sensible no.
- Whether an overlay traps the focus. Only noticeable in testing.
- Whether the reading order matches the meaning. Needs an actual screen reader.
The fastest meaningful test takes ten minutes and needs no tool: put the mouse away and operate the page using only tab, enter and the arrow keys. Open the home page, navigate to the contact form, fill it in, submit it.
Two things almost always stand out: the focus is invisible in several places, and a menu or overlay can be entered but not left. Both are serious faults, neither is reported by automated checks, and both are fixed in under an hour.
The accessibility statement
Covered providers have to set out how their offering meets the requirements. What belongs in it:
- The state of implementation — including openly named gaps.
- A way to get in touch about barriers encountered.
- The date of the last review.
An honest statement with named gaps and a timeline is better than one claiming full conformity that a review would not confirm.
Help me assess what we need to do on accessibility. Our situation: - What we offer: [offering] - Do we sell digitally to consumers? [yes / no / partly] - Markets: [countries] - Employees and annual turnover: [details] - Interactive elements on the site: [forms, booking, shop, configurator, login] - What we have already implemented: [bullet points] Tasks: 1. Assess whether and for which parts of our offering the EU obligation is likely to apply. Name the points that must definitely be assessed by a legal professional. 2. From the ten standard measures, name the ones most important for our interactive elements, and justify that. 3. Write a checklist for a keyboard test of our site: which paths we walk through and what to look for. 4. Name what automated checking tools would probably not find on our site. 5. Draft the outline of an accessibility statement with placeholders for our current state. Do not invent statutory provisions, deadlines or penalty amounts.
In closing
For an ordinary business website, accessibility at level AA is not a major project: ten measures, most of them good practice anyway, cover the bulk of it — an effort in the order of a few days.
The most effective step costs nothing at all: put the mouse away and operate your own site with the keyboard once. What stands out there is what no automated tool finds — and it is usually the most serious faults.
Common questions
Who does the accessibility obligation apply to?
In the EU since 28 June 2025, mainly to providers selling digitally to consumers — online shops, booking and appointment flows. Purely business-to-business offerings and purely informational sites are generally not covered; micro-enterprises providing services are partly exempt. Public bodies were already obliged before this.
Does this apply to Swiss companies too?
In Switzerland the Disability Discrimination Act obliges mainly public bodies. But anyone supplying consumers in the EU falls under the EU rules for that offering — so the question arises for Swiss companies with EU business as well.
Which measures deliver the most?
Five cover most of the findings: meaningful alt text for images, sufficient contrast (4.5:1 for normal text), full keyboard operability, a visible focus outline, and labelled form fields with an associated label rather than mere placeholder text.
Are automated checking tools enough?
No, they find only part of the problems. They reliably detect missing alt text, weak contrast and missing field labels. They cannot detect whether an alt text is meaningful, whether the keyboard order runs logically, or whether an overlay traps the focus.
Does accessibility help visibility too?
Yes — nine of the ten standard measures feed directly into findability. Heading hierarchy, alt text, meaningful link text and marked-up language are the same things search engines and answer engines need: a screen reader and a crawler both read the structure rather than seeing the picture.
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