Accessibility Industry Update: May 2025
Welcome to the QualityLogic industry update for the month of May 2025!
While it seemed like a quiet month, there’s still a lot to cover!
As always, let us know if you think we’ve missed something, or share the link with your colleagues or partners who may benefit from some or all of this information. You can also sign up to receive these accessibility updates via email.
Contents:
- Conferences and Events
- Changes to Colorado OIT Rulemaking on the Horizon
- Massive Layoffs Hit the Department of Education
- What We’ve Been Reading
Takeaways from the Seventh Annual WebAIM Million
Every year since 2019, WebAIM has used the automated WAVE scanner on the top 1 million websites, according to the Tranco ranking. These results are then compiled into a comprehensive report that provides a peek into the overall state of web accessibility.
Here is a brief summary of the findings. For more, check out the full report.
- On average, 51 errors were detected per page (50.96M total) representing a decrease of 10.3 % since 2024
- 94.8 % of pages still show at least one WCAG 2 A/AA failure
- The complexity of homepages continues to increase, from an average of 1,173 elements/page in 2024 to 1,257 elements / page in 2025.
- The pages with fewer errors have gotten better, while the pages that have historically had more errors are getting worse.
The most common issues, in order of prevalence:
- Low contrast text: Present on 79.1% of pages.
- Missing alternative text for images: Present on 55.5% of pages.
- Missing form input labels: Present on 48.2% of pages.
- Empty links: Present on 45.4% of pages.
- Empty buttons: Present on 29.6% of pages.
- Missing document language: Present on 15.8% of page.
Notably, this list has remained unchanged over the past five years, a strong signal that when you get right down to it, a good amount of digital accessibility is just doing a few things right, with consistency. If you have to pick a handful of practices to adopt it’s difficult to go wrong here, with the addition of things like reflow and keyboard navigation which have historically been difficult to test via automated means alone.
Perhaps unsurprisingly, Government, personal finance, and nonprofit/charity sectors perform best (around 25% better on average) while style/fashion, shopping, and sports lag behind by 30% – 40%.
Legal Review
More on the DOJ accessiBe Settlement
If you’ve been reading these newsletters for a while, or at least keeping up with happenings in the accessibility space, you’ll probably recall the FTC’s crackdown on accessiBe back in January of 2025.
If not, here’s a quick synopsis: accessiBe provides a one-line code snippet that embeds an overlay that they claim can transform an inaccessible website into an accessible one. You might know this as the “use website in a screen reader mode” button at the top of a page. The accessibility community has been speaking out about the harm posed by overlays for years. Following a slew of legal cases, the FTC responded with an order requiring accessiBe to pay $1 million for deceptive claims.
And now, following a period of public comment, the commission has voted 3-0 to approve the order and send letters back to those who submitted comments
In addition to having to fork over $1 million, accessiBe is officially no longer allowed to claim that their overlay can make a product WCAG compliant or effectively monitor compliance over time without substantial proof, proof that is by all accounts impossible to currently achieve—even in the modern age of GenAI.
Dates to Remember
- As a reminder, the deadline for digital accessibility compliance under the European Accessibility Act (EAA) is June 28, 2025. That’s just a little over a month away. Are you ready?
- In Colorado, the grace period for HB21-1110 ends on July 1, 2025, at which point all government entity’s websites are expected to comply with WCAG 2.1 level AA.
- The Accessibility for Manitobans Act (AMA) went into effect for private sector, nonprofits and small municipalities on May 1, 2025.
What We’ve Been Reading
- April 2025 Accessibility Legal Update – Converge Accessibility
- New Manitoba accessibility requirements for private businesses & non-profits: How to comply by May 2025 – MLT Aikins
- Creating a more accessible web with Aria Notify – Microsoft Edge Blog
- Marriott’s CEO spoke out about DEI. The next day, he had 40,000 emails from his associates
- WCAG in Plain English
- Prioritizing accessibility bugs for maximum impact – CivicActions Accessibility: One of the points we’ve been habitually making for years is that when you’re staring at a bunch of accessibility issues, the best way of getting a head start is to optimize for the things that provide maximum results/value with minimal time/effort. This matrix expounds on that concept a bit and could be a good read if you’re feeling a little overwhelmed.
- The True Cost of Inaccessibility and Why Metrics Matter More Than Ever – TestParty
- Automated WCAG Testing Is Grrreat! – Adrian Roselli
- How to write error messages that actually help users rather than frustrate them – Piccalilli
- Don’t use scores from automatic tools in your accessibility statement – do this instead – Bogdan on Digital Accessibility
- Contrast.report: An open-source WCAG Color Contrast Checker that puts privacy first and is super easy to use.
- Where AI Meets Accessibility: Considerations for Higher Education – Every Learner Everywhere
- Is “ethical AI” an oxymoron? – hidde.blog: This one isn’t specific to accessibility, though it touches on some of the darker aspects of AI in a rather thought-provoking way.
- Digital Accessibility is a Civil Right – Karl Groves: An eloquent critique of an article posted by the City Journal scrutinizing and criticizing the landscape of ADA related lawsuits.
- Mobile Content Accessibility Guidelines (MCAG)
- Detroit Metro Airport rolls out autonomous wheelchairs for passengers – Lewiston Tribune
- Can Businesses Exclude Service Animals Based on the Allergies of Others? – ADA Title III
- Tools of the Trade: Accessibility Without the Cost – Equal Entry
As always, let us know if you think we’ve missed something, or share the link with your colleagues or partners who may benefit from some or all of this information. You can also sign up to receive these accessibility updates via email.