Website Accessibility Checklist for WCAG 2.2 AA

You're outside with one hand free. The screen is bright and the text on the page is small and grey. You can't read the price, so you go back.

That is an accessibility problem, and you don't need a disability to have it.

A website accessibility checklist is a short list of tests that confirm people can see, read, tap and move through your pages. Most sites aim for WCAG 2.2 level AA, the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines at their middle level.

How common are accessibility problems?

Very. Every year WebAIM tests the home pages of the top million sites. In its 2026 study of 1,000,000 home pages, 95.9% had detectable WCAG 2 failures. The average page had 56.1 detected errors.

Six problems made up most of them:

Problem	Share of home pages
Low contrast text	83.9%
Missing alt text on images	53.1%
Missing form labels	51%
Empty links	46.3%
Empty buttons	30.6%
Missing page language	13.5%

WebAIM's tests catch only what a machine can detect, so the real rate is higher. And the sample is the most visited sites, not small business sites. Still, your site very likely has at least one of these.

What does the checklist cover?

Eight checks. Each one is something you can test today.

1. Text contrast. Normal text needs a contrast ratio of at least 4.5:1 against its background. Large text, at 18 point or 14 point bold, needs 3:1. The W3C's contrast rule treats the number as a threshold, so 4.499:1 fails.
2. Alt text. Every image that carries meaning has a short description. A decorative one is marked so a screen reader skips it.
3. Form labels. Every field says what it is for, in text a screen reader can read, not only a grey hint inside the box.
4. Link text. A link says where it goes. "Read our pricing" works. "Click here" does not.
5. Button names. A button with only an icon still needs a name.
6. Page language. The page says what language it is in, so a screen reader pronounces it correctly.
7. Tap size. WCAG 2.2 asks for tap targets at least 24 by 24 CSS pixels, with exceptions such as links inside a sentence.
8. Keyboard. You can reach every link, button and field by pressing Tab, and you can see where you are.

How do you test your site?

Start with the cheap tests, then add a tool.

1. Open your homepage on your phone outside, or turn the screen brightness up. Can you read everything?
2. Press Tab on your keyboard from the top of the page. Can you reach every button and see which one is selected?
3. Click a few form fields. Does each one keep its label when you start typing?
4. Run a free checker such as axe or WAVE on your homepage and read the first five results.
5. Run the Swift Site Audit. Its Open step runs a WCAG 2.2 A and AA check on your homepage.

Fix contrast and labels first. They are the most common failures, and fixing them helps the most people.

How do you fix low contrast?

It is the most common failure, and the easiest to fix.

Pick the text and its background, then run the pair through a free contrast checker. If the ratio is under 4.5:1 for normal text, darken the text or lighten the background until it passes. Change one color at a time and check again.

Brand colors are the usual trouble. A bright orange or a light grey can look great on a logo and fail as small text. You can keep the bright color for large shapes and buttons, and use a darker shade of it for small words. Check the pair in both light and dark mode if your site has both.

Placeholder text in form fields fails often too. Grey on white at a small size is hard to read. Give each field a visible label above it instead.

What did our own site find?

We checked our own homepage with axe against WCAG 2.2 A and AA on 2026-10-14. It found 0 violations on the homepage and on 4 pages we re-checked.

That is not the same as done. We have not yet had a real screen-reader pass with VoiceOver or NVDA, and we have not published an accessibility statement. For that reason we keep the W3C conformance logo off the site until both are done.

Earlier in the same pass the checker found small orange text, white text on orange buttons and light grey text that failed contrast. We darkened the colors until they passed.

What can a checker not see?

Quite a lot. A tool can tell that an image has alt text. It can't tell whether the text describes the image. It can tell that a button has a name, but not whether the name makes sense.

An automatic run also covers one page. Your checkout, your forms and your PDFs may have problems it never looks at.

Treat a clean result as a good start. Real people with real assistive tools find the rest.

What did we fix on our own pages?

We ran axe against our pages in light mode at two widths, 1440 and 390 pixels. Most of what it found was color.

Small orange text on a light background failed the contrast ratio, and so did white text on our orange buttons. We added a darker orange for small text, #C8331E in light mode and #FF4B34 in dark. We gave buttons a deeper orange fill so white text passes. We also darkened the light greys that were too pale to read at small sizes.

Layout needed work as well. At 320 pixels wide, a page has to reflow without sideways scrolling. We checked that, and checked that every link and button shows where the keyboard focus is.

Which pages should you test first?

Start with the pages a buyer must use to reach you, then widen.

1. Your homepage.
2. Your contact or booking page, including the form.
3. Your top service page.
4. Any page with a checkout, a quote form or a download.

If those four pass, test the rest in order of how many buyers see them. A clean homepage and a broken contact form is a bad trade.

FAQ

What is WCAG 2.2 AA?

WCAG is a set of guidelines from the W3C for making web content usable by more people. The 2.2 version has three levels: A, AA and AAA. Level AA is the one most sites aim for.

Does a free accessibility checker find everything?

No. It finds what a machine can detect, such as missing labels and low contrast. A person has to judge whether alt text and button names make sense.

How often should you run the checklist?

After any change to your design, colors or forms, and at least once a quarter. New pages bring new problems.

Next, a visitor decides whether to trust you. If you'd like help with your own checklist, book a free 30-minute consultation. We want your success as much as you do.