How to make web pages accessible
Written content
You must make sure that text on your web page is easy for people to read and understand.
Plain English
Write your web page in plain English. Plain English uses simple wording and does not contain jargon.
Plain English benefits everyone. This includes:
- People with low literacy skills. 16.4% of adults in England, or 7.1 million people, have 'very poor literacy skills' (Source - National Literacy Trust)
- Specialists and people with mid to high literacy skills. Government Digital Service (GDS) advice on writing content says 'research shows that higher literacy people prefer plain English because it allows them to understand the information as quickly as possible'
How to write in plain English
There are lots of resources to help you write good web content:
- LocalGov Digital explains how to make your content easy to understand
- GOV.UK have a guide on how to write well for your audience
- Hemingway Editor - a readability checker that helps you make your writing clearer
- The Writer's readability checker - a readability checker that will assess the reading age someone needs to be to understand your writing
Technical terms and abbreviations
You can include technical terms and abbreviations on your web page. But you should explain what they mean the first time you use them.
For example, the first time you use an abbreviation like 'NCC', write 'Norfolk County Council (NCC)'.
Instructions
Your web page might contain instructions that users need to follow.
You must make sure that any instructions on your web page don't rely on the user being able to see the web page or hear its content. This includes only describing things based on their:
- Colour
- Shape
- Size
- Visible location
- Sound
You should make your instructions more accessible by referring to visible text. Even though some visually impaired people may not be able to see the text, they can use assistive technology to translate it to a format they can access.
You can still include references to appearance or sound too, if you think they will help users.
For example:
- Don't write: 'Apply using the square green button'
- Do write: 'Apply using the square green 'Submit' button'
