How to do an accessibility audit of your website (a step-by-step guide)
An accessibility audit checks whether people with disabilities can use your website, measured against the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG). You can do a useful first pass yourself in an afternoon with free tools. Here's the same process we follow, simplified.
1. Pick the pages that matter
You don't need to test every page. Choose a representative sample: your home page, one of each page type (a service page, a blog post, a product page), your contact or booking form, and any page people must use to buy from you. The W3C calls this a "representative sample" in its WCAG-EM evaluation methodology.
2. Decide on your standard
Most audits test against WCAG 2.2 Level A and AA. Level A covers the most basic barriers; AA adds things like color contrast and visible focus. Write the standard down so you're measuring against something specific.
3. Run automated scanners
Free scanners catch common, clear-cut problems quickly:
- WAVE shows icons on the page for errors like missing alt text and empty links.
- axe-core, available as the axe DevTools browser extension, lists rule failures with the exact element.
- Lighthouse, built into Chrome DevTools, gives a quick accessibility score.
- You can also check website accessibility with our free scanner, which runs an automated check on one page.
Treat the results as a starting list, not a verdict. A page can pass every automated check and still be hard to use. Scanners can't tell whether alt text is accurate, whether headings make sense, or whether a menu works with a keyboard.
4. Test with only a keyboard
This is the single most revealing manual test. Click into the address bar, put your mouse aside, and press Tab repeatedly.
- Can you reach every link, button, menu item, and form field?
- Can you always see where you are? There should be a clear outline or highlight.
- Does focus move in a sensible order, top to bottom?
- Can you open menus and pop-ups, and close them with Esc?
- Do you ever get stuck and can't tab away?
Our sample report shows what this finds: on the W3C demo page, focus disappears on most links, a problem no scanner flagged.
5. Listen with a screen reader
Free screen readers are built in or easy to install: VoiceOver on Mac and iPhone, and NVDA on Windows. You don't need to be an expert. Listen for:
- Images announced with useful descriptions, not file names
- Links that make sense out of context, not just "click here"
- Form fields that announce their label
- Headings you can jump between that outline the page
See our guide to manual accessibility testing and screen reader testing for a fuller checklist.
6. Check contrast, zoom, and motion
- Contrast: normal text needs a contrast ratio of at least 4.5:1 against its background; large text needs 3:1.
- Zoom: zoom your browser to 200%. Nothing should overlap or get cut off. At 400% (or a 320-pixel-wide window), content should fit without sideways scrolling.
- Motion: anything that moves for more than five seconds, like a carousel, needs a pause button.
7. Test your forms properly
Submit each form empty and with mistakes. Are errors explained in text, next to the field, and announced by the screen reader? See form accessibility best practices.
8. Write it up so it gets fixed
For each issue, record the page, the element, the WCAG criterion, who it affects, and a specific fix. Rank issues by impact: anything that stops someone completing a task comes first. A list nobody can act on doesn't help anyone.
When to get help
A do-it-yourself pass is a great start. A professional audit adds depth: experienced screen reader testing, every WCAG 2.2 AA criterion checked, and fixes written for your platform. Either way, the goal is the same: a site more people can use.