Accessibility is a fascinating and growing field dedicated to making products accessible to a wide range of people with different disabilities or other challenges. As UX designers, we should always think about inclusive design, ensuring our product is accessible to various types of people, especially those with disabilities, whether permanent or temporary.
Motor impairments
Visual impairments
Hearing impairments
Neurological issues
Learning disabilities
Environmental limitations
Sometimes we get so attached to our product that we forget to check if it’s accessible and usable in terms of color, text, motion, and element placement. As designers, we need to emphasize and ensure a wide range of people, not just ourselves, can enjoy our product.
Here are some tips to make your products more accessible:
Combining color and typography, text weight, icons, etc., can help differentiate items, especially for users with visual impairments or attention issues, as well as those in noisy environments.
Ensure elements are consistent across all screens without sudden surprises. This helps users understand the context and reduces the need for relearning, lowering cognitive load.
Write detailed headings and tags to help users understand their tasks on each screen. Tools like screen readers can assist users in navigating the content. It’s recommended to use a text reader plugin to ensure your product’s accessibility.
Ensure call-to-action buttons are at least 34×34 pixels in size for easy clicking and leave surrounding space for comfortable interaction. This helps users with motor challenges operate the device more easily.
Make sure your product is operable using only the keyboard, allowing users who don’t use a mouse to navigate and operate the platform. Ensure the code is clean and organized so accessibility systems can easily read it.
Define keyboard shortcuts to make the product easier to operate with one hand, benefiting users with physical limitations or those who prefer quick access through shortcuts.
Ensure logical and hierarchical tab navigation, so users relying on assistive technologies can understand the content logically without getting lost.
Provide detailed alt text for images to help visually impaired users understand the content.
Ensure animations are not too fast to avoid triggering seizures. Avoid animating the same content more than three times per second to prevent cognitive overload. Offer options to adjust or stop animations, aiding users with attention issues or visual impairments.
nsure line spacing is at least 1.5 times the font size and paragraph spacing is twice the font size. Use at least 14-pixel text, preferably in black, to enhance readability for users with learning or visual disabilities.
Ensure high contrast between text/elements/icons and their backgrounds to aid readability, particularly for color-blind or visually impaired users.
Accessibility is a fascinating field with many tools at our disposal to make products more enjoyable and simpler for a broad audience, ultimately creating a better world.
Here are some helpful links for further reading:
https://www.interaction-design.org/literature/topics/accessibility
https://www.smashingmagazine.com/2018/04/designing-accessibility-inclusion/
https://m2.material.io/design/usability/accessibility.html#hierarchy
Hi, I’m Meital Manor, a UX/UI designer with 3+ years of experience in designing complex systems and web/mobile apps. I’m passionate about simplifying problems and creating intuitive, seamless designs that users love.
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