Enhancing Website Accessibility and Usability: Features That Make a Difference

 Creating a visually appealing and functional website is no longer enough. Today, digital experiences must be inclusive and accessible to all users, including those with disabilities. Usability ensures that a website is intuitive and efficient, while accessibility ensures that people of all abilities can engage with it.

In this blog, we explore 10 essential tools and enhancements—spanning both accessibility and usability—that can be implemented on websites to improve the experience for all users. These features not only serve ethical and legal purposes but also contribute to better engagement, higher SEO rankings, and broader reach.

1. Accessibility Toolbar

An Accessibility Toolbar is a centralized control panel that allows users to customize their browsing experience according to their individual needs. This typically includes features such as increasing or decreasing font size, toggling high-contrast mode, enabling text-to-speech, adjusting cursor size, and stopping animations.

Why It Matters

Accessibility toolbars empower users to tailor the website's interface in real-time without requiring special software or browser extensions. By including this feature, you instantly make your website friendlier to users with vision impairments, reading difficulties, or motor control issues.

How to Implement

• Use open-source accessibility toolkits such as EqualWeb, UserWay, or Accessible Rich Internet Applications (ARIA) widgets.

• Ensure the toolbar is easy to locate, typically positioned in a persistent and accessible corner of the page.

2. Keyboard Navigation Tips

Some users rely solely on the keyboard to navigate through a website, either due to physical impairments or personal preference. Offering Keyboard Navigation Tips—such as “Press Tab to navigate through links” or “Use Enter to activate a button”—helps these users interact more effectively.

Why It Matters

Users who cannot use a mouse or touchpad need clear guidance on how to navigate a site with just the keyboard. Without such instructions, they may struggle or leave the site entirely.

Best Practices

• Display a short guide or a help section dedicated to keyboard navigation.

• Implement visible keyboard focus states on all interactive elements.

• Use semantic HTML elements to ensure predictable tab order.

3. Screen Reader Friendly Elements

Screen readers convert text on a website into synthesized speech. For this to work effectively, screen reader-friendly elements must be used throughout your site. These include appropriate ARIA labels, alt text, and semantic HTML structures.

Why It Matters

For blind or visually impaired users, screen readers are their primary means of navigating websites. Mislabelled elements or improper structures can make your site unusable for this audience.

Implementation Strategies

• Use ARIA roles and labels for buttons, menus, and other non-standard elements.

• Provide meaningful alt text for images, charts, and infographics.

• Avoid using ambiguous link text like “Click Here.”

4. Focus Indicators

Focus indicators are visual cues—usually a border or glow—that show which element on a page is currently selected by the keyboard cursor. This is essential for those navigating with a keyboard.

Why It Matters

Without visible focus indicators, users cannot know where they are on the page, leading to confusion or errors. Modern design trends often remove these outlines, which significantly harms accessibility.

Best Practices

• Ensure all focusable elements (like links, form inputs, and buttons) have a visible and high-contrast focus style.

• Test the site using keyboard-only navigation to verify focus movement.

5. High-Contrast Mode

A High-Contrast Mode toggle allows users to switch to a color scheme that makes text and interface elements stand out more sharply. This is especially helpful for users with low vision or color blindness.

Why It Matters

Text that blends into the background or uses subtle color differences can be unreadable for some users. High-contrast modes reduce eye strain and make content easier to perceive.

How to Integrate

• Offer a button or switch to toggle high-contrast mode.

• Use CSS media queries like @media (prefers-contrast: high) to detect system settings.

• Choose color combinations that pass WCAG 2.1 AA or AAA contrast ratios.

6. Skip Navigation Links

Skip Navigation Links allow users to bypass repetitive elements—like headers or navigation bars—and go directly to the main content. These links are especially useful for screen reader and keyboard-only users.

Why It Matters

Navigating through the same set of links on every page can be time-consuming and frustrating. Skip links streamline the process and improve usability.

Implementation Tips

• Place the link at the top of the page using a standard anchor (<a href="#main-content">Skip to main content</a>).

• Hide it visually using CSS but make it visible when it receives keyboard focus.

• Ensure the destination ID (e.g., #main-content) is properly defined on the page.

7. Read-Aloud Text

Read-Aloud Text tools convert on-screen text into speech using the browser’s built-in speech synthesis. This is particularly helpful for users with reading difficulties, dyslexia, or visual impairments.

Why It Matters

Some users absorb information better through audio than visual means. Others may rely on text-to-speech as a primary accessibility tool.

Implementation Ideas

• Use the Web Speech API (speechSynthesis) to allow the browser to read selected text.

• Add a "Read this page" button at the top of each article or blog post.

• Allow users to highlight text and trigger voice output dynamically.

8. Accessible Forms

Forms are a major part of user interaction online, from signing up for newsletters to making purchases. Ensuring Accessible Forms means adding proper labels, using fieldsets, and providing clear error messages.

Why It Matters

Forms that are not accessible can lock out users from important actions like contacting support, completing purchases, or submitting feedback.

Form Accessibility Checklist

• Each input should have a <label> associated using for and id.

• Use aria-required="true" for mandatory fields.

• Provide helpful error messages using aria-live regions.

• Group related fields using <fieldset> and <legend> elements.

• Use placeholder text only as a supplement, not a replacement for labels.

9. Resizeable Text

Allowing users to resize text without breaking the layout is critical for readability. Many users with vision challenges rely on increasing text size through browser settings or site controls.

Why It Matters

Websites that break or overflow when text is enlarged create poor user experiences and discourage long visits.

Best Practices

• Use relative units like em or % instead of absolute units like px.

• Avoid fixed container heights; let content flow naturally.

• Test your site by increasing text size to 200% using browser zoom and ensuring all content remains usable.

10. Accessible Image Descriptions

Images are powerful communication tools, but they are inaccessible unless accompanied by descriptions or alt text. These descriptions allow screen readers to convey the meaning or purpose of an image to users.

Why It Matters

Visual users might understand a concept immediately through an image, but blind users need alternative text to gain the same insight.

Guidelines for Writing Alt Text

• Be concise yet descriptive.

• Describe the image’s function, not just its appearance.

• Avoid saying “image of” or “picture of”—just state the content directly.

• For decorative images, use empty alt attributes (alt="") to signal screen readers to skip them.

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Final Thoughts

Improving accessibility and usability is not a one-time task—it’s a continuous commitment to inclusive design. By implementing features like accessibility toolbars, keyboard navigation tips, screen reader support, and high-contrast modes, you’re not just meeting compliance standards. You’re welcoming a larger, more diverse audience to your website.

The benefits are extensive: increased user satisfaction, reduced bounce rates, better SEO rankings, and adherence to legal frameworks such as the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) or the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG).

In a digital age where inclusivity is no longer optional, these ten enhancements represent just the beginning. As developers, designers, and content creators, it is our collective responsibility to ensure that the web is a space for everyone—regardless of ability.