The role of software testing in promoting website accessibility
As Tim Berners-Lee himself once said: “The power of the web lies in its universality. Access for all, regardless of disability, is an essential aspect.” With more than 1 billion people living with some form of disability, and even more affected by temporary or situational challenges related to vision, hearing and other impairments, ensuring the inclusivity of websites or applications has a clear link with brand reputation and operating results. However, despite a growing number of digital access regulations, WebAIM’s 2023 analysis of the 1 million largest websites on the Internet found that 96.3% had detectable errors in the Web Content Accessibility Guideline (WCAG).
Testing web accessibility as part of the software development life cycle (SDLC) is an important step toward driving inclusivity. Not without challenges for organizations, the right awareness, strategies and tools will go a long way in meeting compliance requirements and ensuring a positive user experience for everyone, regardless of disability.
Chief Digital Officer at Tricentis.
Why website accessibility is important
Brand reputation and corporate social responsibility are certainly key elements why website accessibility and inclusivity are important. Just ask Domino’s. In 2021, Guillermo Robles, a blind man, successfully reached the end of a legal dispute with the pizza chain after he was unable to order food on the company website or mobile app despite using screen reading software. The California court ruled in Robles’ favor, and Domino’s was ordered to meet with WCAG and agree to a financial settlement with the defendant.
Combine reputation with the fact that the global disability market controls more than $13 trillion in disposable income, according to the Return on Disability report, and you have a powerful argument for prioritizing inclusivity. By integrating accessibility tools such as speech recognition, screen readers, color contrast and zoomed text into websites, companies can broaden their audience, potentially quadrupling the target customer base. Conversely, UK retailers could lose £17.1 billion in online sales a year if they don’t meet the needs of disabled consumers, according to disability and diversity consultancy Freeney Williams.
Despite these risks to brand reputation and lost revenue potential, not enough companies include accessibility testing in their SDLC. According to WebAIM, the most common web accessibility errors are low-contrast text (84%), missing alt text for images (58%), and empty links (50%). These are all important mistakes that can be discovered when testing software.
Fortunately, increasing global legislation, such as the Equality Act and the Public Sector Bodies Accessibility Regulations in Britain, and Section 508 of the United States Rehabilitation Act, which requires all federal electronic content to be accessible, will draw attention to similar access for people with disabilities. disabilities. Furthermore, organizations that fail to comply with the new standards of the European Accessibility Act, when it comes into effect in 2025, could face heavy fines – potentially up to 2% of their total turnover, depending on the severity of the violation. So now is the time to start planning accessibility tests.
Accessibility testing
Accessibility testing evaluates the accessibility of a website, application or software for individuals with disabilities, including visual, hearing, cognitive, motor or other impairments. Principles of the World Wide Web Consortium include observable information and user interface, operable user interface and navigation, understandable information and user interface, and robust content and reliable interpretation.
But even in industries where accessibility to websites, applications and software is most likely to be needed, such as public sector, healthcare and financial services, many organizations struggle to adopt accessibility testing, due to a lack of time, awareness or resources – or possibly all of the above. But with the right strategies, it is possible to overcome these common roadblocks and begin improving accessibility, allowing developers to test for quality and meet a range of compliance measures, such as those outlined in the WCAG and under Section 508.
Lack of time: Agile teams work in rapid release cycles with tight deadlines. Having to manually check an application’s accessibility slows down release cycles and time to market. While manual accessibility testing is essential for the user perspective and complex testing scenarios, automated accessibility testing for basic scenarios and to catch issues early in development saves a lot of time.
Using automation, teams can run accessibility tests alongside existing test cases, reuse them to run tests much earlier in the development cycle, and identify WCAG issues such as empty links, basic color contrast, missing alt text, page title, ARIA (Accessible Rich Internet Applications) labels, and more. While automated testing can’t cover all aspects of accessibility, and final penetration testing is needed to pick up remaining issues, catching as much as possible as early as possible in the development pipeline certainly goes a long way.
Deficiency of attentiveness: Many testing teams are simply unaware of accessibility guidelines and standards. But with the European Accessibility Act on the horizon, it is crucial that teams increase their awareness and expertise. For example, the law will require the use of ARIA semantics; a framework that makes it easy for users with disabilities to view, interact with, and access web content and applications. Testing platforms that can scan and identify complex ARIA elements as readable, contextualized controls will therefore be a useful tool for developers – but if they are not aware of the existence of the legislation, how will they know that they are need? Knowledge is power.
Lack of resources: Implementing accessibility testing may require knowledge of specific coding practices and technologies that existing teams may not possess, and leadership may be hesitant to invest in them. However, now that model-based approaches that do not require coding skills are available, testers and business users can efficiently perform automated accessibility testing even without these specific skills and knowledge.
Building a more inclusive, digital world
Now that we have the modern testing tools and techniques to support and accelerate all aspects of accessibility and improve the usability and quality of websites and applications, it is critical that organizations of all shapes and sizes use them to good effect.
This will not only help increase customer interaction with the largest possible audience, positively impacting the bottom line, but will also help level the playing field and meet Tim Berners-Lee’s vision of web universality, access and inclusivity for all .
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