What is web accessibility, and why is it now a legal requirement?

What does web accessibility actually mean?

On an accessible site, a screen reader user hears what a product image shows, someone who can't use a mouse reaches the add to cart button with a keyboard, a person with low vision can enlarge the text without the page falling apart, and anyone who makes a mistake in a checkout form learns what the error is and where.

So accessibility isn't a display setting. It is about how the site's code and content are written. Whether a button has a name, whether a form field has a label, whether the page language is set, colour contrast: these are all decisions made in HTML, CSS and content.

Who does it matter for?

According to the World Health Organization, about 1.3 billion people worldwide, or 1 in 6, experience significant disability. The number is growing as populations age.

Disability doesn't have to be permanent. Someone with an arm in a cast, someone shopping on their phone in bright sunlight, someone who left their glasses at home or is watching a video in a noisy place meets the same barriers. An accessible checkout form is a checkout form with fewer errors for everyone.

Source: World Health Organization (WHO)

What is WCAG, and what are its levels?

WCAG (Web Content Accessibility Guidelines) are the web accessibility guidelines published by the W3C. The current version, WCAG 2.2, was published on 5 October 2023. The guidelines are grouped under four principles:

Every success criterion has a level: A (the most basic barriers), AA (the level most laws require) and AAA (the strictest, usually not required). The EAA in the EU in practice uses Level AA; Türkiye's Circular uses Level A.

Source: W3C, W3C WAI

Which laws require it?

Several legal frameworks point to WCAG. In the EU, the European Accessibility Act (next section). In the US, the ADA and, for federal agencies and their suppliers, Section 508. In the UK, the Equality Act 2010 requires reasonable adjustments, and public sector sites have their own accessibility regulations. In Türkiye, Presidential Circular No. 2025/10, published in the Official Gazette on 21 June 2025, names WCAG 2.2 and the Ministry of Family and Social Services' "Checklist – Level A" as the reference, with two deadlines:

• 1 year (21 June 2026, now passed): public institutions, universities, municipalities, banks, private hospitals, private education institutions, private passenger transport companies, Group A travel agencies and electronic communications operators with more than 200,000 subscribers.
• 2 years (21 June 2027): e-commerce service providers under Law No. 6563. The text sets no turnover or headcount threshold.

The Circular also sets up a Monitoring Commission within the Ministry; it says monitoring results will be announced and that sites found accessible will get a 2-year Accessibility Logo. For details, see our guide to the Circular.

Source: Lexpera, Ministry of Family and Social Services, Türkiye

What is the situation in the EU?

The European Accessibility Act (Directive 2019/882) has applied since 28 June 2025. It covers e-commerce, banking, e-books, electronic communications and passenger transport services offered to consumers in the EU. It looks at who the service is offered to, not where the company is based, so companies outside the EU that sell into it can be in scope too.

The only exemption is for microenterprises providing services: companies with fewer than 10 employees and an annual turnover or balance sheet total of no more than €2 million.

Enforcement is real. In the Netherlands, the ACM announced in March 2026 that 61% of about 100 large online shops it tested were not accessible. In France, a court in Caen ordered Carrefour in June 2026 to make its site accessible within 6 months or pay €500 a day. For sellers outside the EU, see our practical EAA guide.

Source: EUR-Lex, ACM (Netherlands Authority for Consumers and Markets), Faire Face

The EAA and Türkiye's Circular side by side

Note: a new version of EN 301 549 based on WCAG 2.2 (v4.1.1) was published in September 2026. Until the European Commission publishes it in the Official Journal of the EU, the legal reference remains v3.2.1 (WCAG 2.1 AA).

Source: Lexpera, EUR-Lex, AccessibleEU (European Commission)

Where do websites stand today?

Every year, WebAIM runs an automated scan of the home pages of the top 1 million websites. In its February 2026 report, 95.9% of home pages had WCAG failures that automated testing can detect, with an average of 56.1 errors per page. A six-year trend of improvement reversed in 2026.

What these six have in common: an automated scan can find all of them, and most can be fixed with a few lines of code. We explain what automated testing can and can't find in a separate post.

Source: WebAIM

Where should you start?

1. Scan your site with an automated tool and look at the templates with the most traffic (home, product, cart, checkout or application form).
2. Go through the critical flow once from start to finish with the keyboard only: Tab, Shift+Tab, Enter, Space.
3. Sort the issues by where they come from: your code, your theme or your platform.
4. Fix what stops people completing the task first: unnamed buttons, unlabelled fields, menus that don't open with a keyboard.
5. Publish an accessibility statement: say what you have done, what is still open and how users can reach you.

For platform-specific steps, see our checklists.