The practice of designing digital content and experiences — websites, emails, PDFs — to be usable by people with disabilities, including visual, auditory, motor, and cognitive impairments, commonly guided by the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) and, in the U.S., relevant to compliance under the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA).
Why it matters
Accessibility isn't a niche concern — a meaningful share of any audience has some form of disability affecting how they use digital content, and beyond the ethical case, inaccessible websites have increasingly been the subject of real legal action under ADA-related claims.
In a sentence
"We ran an accessibility audit on the new landing page and fixed several color-contrast issues that would have made the CTA hard to read for users with low vision."
Related terms
- Often confused with: Usability (accessibility specifically addresses barriers for people with disabilities; usability is the broader concept of how easy and intuitive a product or page is to use for anyone, disability or not — accessibility is a necessary subset of good usability, not a separate, optional concern).
- Synonyms: A11y (numeronym shorthand common in technical contexts).