Why Accessibility

Anyone at anytime can face a disability which can be temporary or permanent. Here are some interesting disability statistics from the US Centers for Disease Control.

• 26% (1 out of 4) of all adults in the United States have some type of disability
• By 65-years of age 2 out of 5 have some form of disability
• 13.7% of all adults in the U.S. have a mobility impairment
• 10.8% of all adults in the U.S. have a cognitive impairment
• 5.9% of all adults in the U.S. have a hearing impairment
• 4.6% of all adults in the U.S. have a visual impairment

This is approximately 1/4th of the US population -- do you really want to exclude that large of a chunk of the population from being able to utilize your product or service?

Courts have been ruling that the Americans with Disabilities Act not only applies to our physical real estate, but to our digital real estate as well.

• 2020 was a record breaking year for ADA litigation related to digital real estate.
• Courts are increasingly ruling that digital real estate must be accessible just like a physical building.
• Domino’s Pizza — one of the biggest examples in 2019.
• Check out the statistics.

Designing and building your application not only helps users with disabilities; it helps users of all abilities.

• Providing sufficient color contrast helps people reading content on a mobile device in bright sunlight or a dark room.
• Captions benefit people in noisy/extremely quiet environments.
• Age related limitations that may not be identified as a disability.
• Hierarchically ordered headings can help all users understand the page structure and find content of interest.

• Users will not be able to perform the task required of them.
• Users will get frustrated and leave the site.
• Users may tell others about their “bad experience”
• User May start litigation.

Designing and building applications with accessibility in mind benefits users of all abilities. When designed and built correctly, technology really levels the playing field. Check out the video below to see different assistive technologies in use and the freedom it provides for users.