Read time: 1 minute 10 seconds

Celebrating accessibility requirements as a set of design principals helps you create a better product for all users.

  • Briana has a lower tech literacy level and needs a site’s layout to be clear.
  • Julian has low vision and uses a screen reader to navigate the web.
  • Kendra has a newborn and her attention is often divided; Kendra needs to be able to understand a site’s contents at a glance.

Steps to take

  1. Adopt an inclusive design mentality.
  2. Understand that almost everyone experiences some type of disability. This can be permanently, temporarily, or situational. For example: having only one arm is a permanent condition, having an arm in a cast is temporary, and holding a baby in one arm is situational. But in each case you’re restricted to completing tasks with one arm.
  3. Look for ways that making your product easier to use for people with disability also improves the experience for everyone.
  4. Design for progressive enhancement by making sure every person is able to use your product using the most basic technologies, while layering on better experiences for those who can use them.
  5. When conducting user research, make sure the diversity of your participants reflects the diverse abilities, circumstances, and backgrounds of your actual users.
  6. Watch World Wide Web Consortium's (W3C) clear layout and design video (1 minute 5 seconds):

  • Transcript and translations: clear layout and design (W3C)

  • Page last updated: 22 June 2021