Usability and accessibility are essential qualities of digital spaces that welcome and serve everyone. For people with disabilities who rely on accessible digital content in daily life, inclusive design fosters independence and engagement. Yet today, many websites — even those of major brands — still contain barriers that prevent equal access for users who are blind or have low vision, compromising their ability to fully engage and connect.
Accessibility is a powerful driver of loyalty and trust. In fact, 84% of blind and low-vision consumers report that accessibility strongly impacts their decision to return to a business. Looking forward, McKinsey & Co predicts that the cost of inaccessible digital content will increase by 2030 as demand rises for accessible products and services, especially with a rapidly aging global population.
A 2022 report from the American Foundation for the Blind underscores this growing need: while 64.6% of blind or low-vision users rely on laptops or desktops, an even larger percentage (79.1%) engage primarily through smartphones. Creating accessible digital spaces helps support everyone’s effort to participate fully, regardless of ability.
This World Usability Day reminds us that inclusive digital products require more than meeting technical accessibility standards; they’re about making sure everyone can connect, interact, and thrive in an increasingly digital world. Ensuring your digital products are accessible and easy to use doesn’t just create a competitive edge — it demonstrates a commitment to inclusion that resonates with all users.
Accessibility and Usability: A Powerful Partnership for Inclusion
When we think of accessibility, we often focus on removing barriers that prevent people with disabilities from accessing and interacting with digital content. But accessibility alone doesn’t guarantee an inclusive experience; usability is just as critical.
David Sloan, PhD, TPGi’s Chief Accessibility Officer and Head of UX, shared a relatable analogy during a timely webinar, illustrating where accessibility and usability meet within inclusive design.
“Imagine a library entrance where the main door has steps but no ramp. Around the back of the library is another door with a ramp to an accessible door. But the ramp is strewn with litter, encroached with overgrown shrubbery that obscures a sign indicating an accessible entrance and passes an outflow vent of fumes from a boiler room. The library is technically accessible to wheelchair users. Still, the user experience is so poor that someone in a wheelchair may feel it’s too challenging to enter the building even if they discover the alternative entrance.”
The ideal approach, David explains, is to design environments and products inclusively from the start, eliminating the need for separate accommodations.
If the library entrance included a ramp alongside the steps, everyone would have equal access from the beginning. An inclusive design is something that enables all users to reach the same destination easily and independently.
In digital design, this mindset means rethinking page structure, navigation, and flow to create a friction-free, universally accessible experience for all users.
Embracing the Principles of Inclusive Design
Usability emphasizes making digital products efficient and effective for the target audience to use for the intended purpose and with maximum satisfaction. As David points out, “When we incorporate accessibility and people with disabilities into the user experience design process, we’re practicing inclusive design.”
In other words, inclusive design means creating physical or digital environments that are usable to the widest possible range of people, recognizing and accommodating individual differences in needs. This builds on technical accessibility, integrating usability principles to create more holistic and user-friendly experiences.
The World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) adds that inclusion is the ultimate goal, aiming to provide an equivalent experience across diverse user groups. By embedding accessibility and usability principles from the outset, organizations can foster digital spaces that benefit everyone, breaking down barriers that historically marginalized certain groups.
Defining User Experience (UX)
User experience (UX) extends beyond the extent to which users can operate the functionality of a user interface. According to the Nielsen Norman Group, “user experience encompasses all aspects of the end-user’s interaction with a company, its services, and its products.”
In this sense, UX shapes how users feel before, during, and after their interaction with a product or service, taking into consideration not only the usability but also emotional and contextual factors.
By incorporating accessibility and usability into UX strategy, we combine technical standards with research into user needs and interaction circumstances to create digital experiences that are empowering for everyone.
As David says, “Sometimes good UX doesn’t mean an interface is enjoyable to use; just that it was possible to do what you needed to do quickly and successfully without experiencing friction.”
He points to an online patient portal that allows you to quickly find test results as being usable, but “even the best example would be difficult to describe as enjoyable to use,” he adds.
The Intersection of Accessibility, UX, and Inclusive Design
Incorporating accessibility within the UX design process fosters inclusive design — a quality that pays close attention to understanding and meeting the needs of different user groups. Inclusive design serves as both a method and an outcome, creating solutions that work effectively for everyone.
It’s about intentionally involving people with disabilities in the design process to create products that are accessible, usable, and worthwhile for all. David underscores the need for a structured, intentional approach to accessibility, saying, “Accessibility doesn’t just happen; it requires a strategic, deliberate approach.”
In practice, this means bringing people with disabilities into the UX design process to identify and overcome potential barriers early on. As David emphasizes, while expertise in technical accessibility guidelines is an important asset to a product team – it can’t fully replace the insights that come from directly engaging with diverse users during the design and development process.
The Benefits of Inclusive User Experience Design
Involving people with disabilities in the design process brings invaluable insights that benefit everyone:
- Better Usability for All: Accessibility best practices, like captions, flexible display, and careful error handling, improve usability for people with disabilities and for other users, including people accessing the product in challenging environments.
- More Inclusive Products: Prioritizing accessibility from the start results in products that reach broader audiences, boosting satisfaction and engagement.
- Improved Efficiency in Design: Integrating accessibility early — a “shift-left” approach — reduces last-minute fixes, creating a more cost-effective design process.
Navigating Challenges in Integrating Accessibility and UX
In real-world scenarios, implementing accessibility can be challenging, especially if:
- Third parties provide digital products.
- Legacy products and content require updates.
- Multiple users publish content on a digital platform.
In these situations, it’s important to adopt a strategic, long-term accessibility plan that prioritizes initiatives based on their impact on users and actions to address existing barriers.
While a full transformation may be gradual, focusing on a manageable strategy allows your organization to evolve accessibility efforts sustainably. This approach shifts the focus from merely meeting standards to delivering truly inclusive digital products.
A structured UX process enhances accessibility while creating an inclusive digital ecosystem where people with disabilities can engage meaningfully and independently with digital content. This is the goal: to create products that enable people of all abilities to succeed in achieving their goals.
Focus on People with Disabilities in the UX Process
UX design can be divided into two main phases: discovery and design.
During the discovery phase, the team aims to identify the problems the product will solve and understand the needs of its intended users. By involving people with disabilities at this stage, the team can gather valuable insights and shape the product from the beginning.
Once we understand the problem, we move into the design phase, creating solutions that address the requirements identified during discovery. Design might involve everything from sketches and wireframes to interactive prototypes.
At this stage, testing prototypes with people with disabilities provides feedback on usability and accessibility, allowing the team to iterate and improve the design based on real user needs.
Discovery Phase: Questions to Answer
In the initial discovery phase, it’s essential to answer questions that reveal how users interact with similar products and navigate challenges:
- How do people complete tasks?
- What common problems do they encounter?
- What workarounds do they use, and when might they abandon a task?
- What design choices work well in other products?
By seeking these insights early on, the team ensures that the final design will address real-world user needs, particularly those of people with disabilities.
Design Phase: Applying Best Practices
The best universal and inclusive design practices should guide your design and development phases. Principles such as the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) provide the foundation, but creativity and context-specific application are essential.
A talented design team can take accessibility guidelines and weave them into an elegant, usable product that meets both functional and aesthetic standards.
Evaluating the Effectiveness of Your Designs
After creating a design, it’s crucial to evaluate its effectiveness through accessibility audits and usability testing. Automated accessibility audits identify potential barriers, while manual reviews confirm these issues and provide a comprehensive list of existing barriers.
Usability testing with people with disabilities, on the other hand, provides direct insight into how accessible and usable digital experiences are for people with disabilities. By observing how people interact with digital content, teams can assess intuitiveness, existing barriers, and overall usability.
This testing can reveal whether initial design assumptions were correct or if adjustments are needed. Sometimes, it confirms that the design is on the right track, providing confidence to proceed.
Evaluation should be continuous, adapting to changes in product design. From a simple sketch to a functional prototype, iterative testing ensures the product remains accessible and user-friendly at every stage.
Accessibility and Usability Are Pillars of Inclusive Design
World Usability Day highlights the importance of usability and accessibility as cornerstones of inclusive digital experiences. By embedding these principles into every stage of design and development, organizations create products that aren’t just functional but enjoyable for everyone.
Through TPGi’s UX Services, Design Reviews, and Usability Testing, companies gain the tools and insights to build products prioritizing accessibility and usability. By partnering with TPGi, organizations can confidently ensure that their digital products meet accessibility standards and deliver inclusive user experiences.
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