Catalog
method#Quality Assurance#Reliability#Governance#Product

Accessibility Testing

A method for systematically identifying and remediating access barriers in digital products by combining automated checks, manual inspections, and user testing.

Accessibility testing is a systematic practice to identify and remediate barriers in digital products.
Established
Medium

Classification

  • Medium
  • Organizational
  • Organizational
  • Intermediate

Technical context

CI/CD pipeline for automated checksIssue tracker (e.g. Jira, GitHub Issues)Design system repository for consistency checks

Principles & goals

Test early: integrate accessibility from the start of the process.Combine: automated and manual methods complement each other.Include affected users: conduct tests with real users with disabilities.
Build
Team, Domain, Enterprise

Use cases & scenarios

Compromises

  • False security from relying only on automated tests.
  • Lack of product/design involvement leads to recurring issues.
  • Poor prioritization delays critical fixes.
  • Place accessibility checks as a gate in CI pipeline.
  • Provide regular training for design and development.
  • Involve affected users early and repeatedly.

I/O & resources

  • Product build or prototype
  • WCAG or internal accessibility checklist
  • Accessible test environments and assistive technologies
  • Remediation tickets with prioritization
  • Audit and user test reports
  • Improved requirements for product and design

Description

Accessibility testing is a systematic practice to identify and remediate barriers in digital products. It combines automated checks, manual inspections and user tests with people with disabilities to ensure WCAG conformance. It is applied across the development lifecycle.

✔

  • Improved usability for all users.
  • Reduced legal risk through WCAG conformance.
  • Better product image and broader market reach.

✖

  • Automated tools do not find all issues.
  • User tests with affected people require time and budget.
  • Some WCAG requirements allow interpretation.

  • Number of accessibility defects found

    Metric capturing barriers found per release or test run.

  • WCAG conformance level

    Percentage of tested pages/flows that meet WCAG criteria.

  • Time to fix critical issues

    Average time from detection to resolution for critical accessibility defects.

Company-wide accessibility program

A SaaS provider introduced automated checks, accessibility guidelines and user testing; barriers were systematically reduced.

Design workshop with affected users

A product team held workshops with visual and motor impairment participants to adapt interaction patterns.

CI integration of accessibility checks

Automated checks were added to CI pipeline; critical failures block releases.

1

Define scope and acceptance criteria based on WCAG.

2

Set up automated checks and integrate into CI.

3

Perform manual reviews and assistive-technology tests.

4

Plan and evaluate user tests with affected participants.

5

Prioritize findings, create tickets and validate fixes.

⚠️ Technical debt & bottlenecks

  • Legacy components lacking ARIA support.
  • Insufficient semantic HTML structures.
  • Missing automated checks for critical flows.
Lack of in-team expertiseLimited resources for user testingUnclear responsibilities between design and engineering
  • Testing only color contrast and ignoring other barriers.
  • Accepting automated reports as complete without review.
  • Conducting user tests without proper recruitment and moderation.
  • Focusing only on desktop and neglecting mobile scenarios.
  • Misunderstanding WCAG level as the sole quality metric.
  • Introducing technical fixes without UX validation.
Knowledge of WCAG guidelinesExperience with automated accessibility toolsAbility to conduct and moderate user tests
Accessible interaction patternsCompliance with legal requirements (WCAG)Scalability of test automation
  • • Time pressure from release cycles
  • • Budget for external user tests is limited
  • • Technical legacy constraints