What are accessibility levels? The starting point to face the construction of an accessible website is to know the status of the portal that we want to improve. What are the errors? What changes are necessary? These two questions are usually common and both have one answer in common: the web accessibility of a portal is defined according to the A, AA and AAA conformity criteria established by the WCAG 2.1 standard.
This document includes four fundamental principles of web accessibility: perceptible, operable, understandable and robust. Based on these premises, three levels are established that determine the degree of accessibility of a portal. Level A is the most basic and meets the fundamental requirements, although it does not guarantee that all users have access.
To achieve this, it is necessary to comply with minimum functionalities, among which the alternatives with text for unwritten content stand out, subtitle the audios, adapt the content to different formats without losing information or avoiding the use of color as the only visual medium. The availability of functions from a keyboard, sufficient reading time, navigable space, the use of a single pointer or legibility are some criteria that must be taken into account.
Public administration, at least AA level
Level AA goes one step further and consists of the elimination of important accessibility barriers. Subtitles for live audio, the ability to view content in landscape and portrait orientation, change the text size by up to 200 percent without losing content, headings and labels, or providing correction suggestions for input errors, among others, are essential to obtain AA compliance.
Public Administrations are required to have at least an AA level in their content and web applications. It is the requirement established by the current legislation and whose adaptation periods, in most cases, have already been exhausted. With the exception of mobile applications, which will have to be adapted before June 23 of this year.
And there is still room to achieve excellence in web accessibility, represented at the AAA level. It is not mandatory, but it is undoubtedly an ideal framework for the website to be a reference with the advantages that it entails in terms of reputation and visibility. Sign language, expanded audio description, restricted use of text images, warnings about waiting times for users, user location or the definition of unusual words are among the requirements for level AAA.
The fulfillment of a higher level of compliance implies that the conditions of the lower level are satisfied. For a website to acquire, for example, an AAA, it is essential that it contains the obligations of levels A and AA.
How do I evaluate web accessibility levels?
To know the accessibility deficiencies that any web portal has, a study by a professional team is essential. The most advisable thing is to request a audit to execute the diagnosis according to the W3V/WAI methodology.
This study will allow us to detail the level of web accessibility and therefore implement the necessary improvements. It should be noted that the levels are granted globally, to the entire page, and in no case is it contemplated that they can be applied in fractions.
