Theme Accessibility

Creating a theme that supports accessibilityAccessibility Accessibility (commonly shortened to a11y) refers to the design of products, devices, services, or environments for people with disabilities. The concept of accessible design ensures both “direct access” (i.e. unassisted) and “indirect access” meaning compatibility with a person’s assistive technology (for example, computer screen readers). (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Accessibility) is mostly about setting healthy defaults. This includes

  • ensuring the menus are accessible from the keyboard,
  • checking that default color contrast meets standards,
  • that the HTMLHTML HTML is an acronym for Hyper Text Markup Language. It is a markup language that is used in the development of web pages and websites. structure uses semantically correct code.

The standards for the WordPress theme directory’s accessibility-ready program are available in the Theme Review handbook, including testing instructions so you can check your own theme.

accessibility-ready does not mean a theme meets WCAGWCAG WCAG is an acronym for Web Content Accessibility Guidelines. These guidelines are helping make sure the internet is accessible to all people no matter how they would need to access the internet (screen-reader, keyboard only, etc) https://www.w3.org/TR/WCAG21/. guidelines at level AA. It means that the theme reaches the minimum standards that the theme review team has set.

WordPress.org Theme Directory

In the Themes Directory on WordPress.org, select the ‘Accessibility Ready’ option in the Feature Filter to browse themes tested against the “Accessibility Ready” guidelines.

WordPress.org themes directory filter with Accessibility Ready tag checked
Want to get your theme listed as “AccessibilityAccessibility Accessibility (commonly shortened to a11y) refers to the design of products, devices, services, or environments for people with disabilities. The concept of accessible design ensures both “direct access” (i.e. unassisted) and “indirect access” meaning compatibility with a person’s assistive technology (for example, computer screen readers). (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Accessibility) Ready” on the Themes Repo? See the themes review handbook for more information.

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