You’ll meet these words in accessibility advice, in Word’s checker and on this site. Each one is explained for people who make documents, not websites. For where to learn more, see our list of resources.
Accessible
A document is accessible when people with disabilities can get the same information from it, and do the same things with it, as everyone else, using the tools they rely on.
No document works for every reader. When we say our templates are accessible, we mean something specific: they’re built to meet WCAG 2.2 AA, a widely used standard that covers many needs, but not all. People with some learning disabilities, for example, may need an Easy Read version, which WCAG doesn’t require.
Accessibility checker
A tool that scans a document for common problems, such as missing alt text or a table with no header row. Word has one built in (Review, Check Accessibility); Google Docs doesn’t. A checker finds what a computer can find. It can’t tell whether your alt text makes sense or your headings are in a sensible order, so a clean result is a good start, not proof.
Accommodation
Something an organization provides so a person with a disability can take part, such as a sign language interpreter, captions or a document in another format. Meeting agendas and event flyers often say how to ask for one, and by when.
Alt text
Short for alternative text: a description attached to a picture, read aloud by screen readers and shown if the picture doesn’t load. Good alt text says what the picture tells the reader in this document, in a sentence or two. A logo’s alt text is usually just the organization’s name.
Assistive technology
Any tool people use to read or work with a document in a way that suits them: screen readers, screen magnifiers, braille displays, voice control and more. Accessible documents are built so these tools can make sense of them.
Contrast ratio
A measure of how much a text color stands out from its background, from 1:1 (none at all) to 21:1 (black on white). WCAG AA asks for at least 4.5:1 for normal text and 3:1 for large text (18 point, or 14 point bold). A free tool such as WebAIM’s contrast checker tells you the ratio for any two colors.
Decorative image
A picture that adds nothing to the meaning, such as a border or a flourish. Mark it as decorative (Word has a setting for this) so screen readers skip it, rather than describing something that doesn’t matter.
Document title
A title stored in the file itself, separate from the file name. Screen readers announce it when the document opens, and a PDF made from the document carries it. In Word it’s set in the file’s properties; in Google Docs, the file name is the title.
Header row
The first row of a table, marked as holding the column headings. When it’s marked, a screen reader can announce the right heading with each cell, so a listener knows that “$4,200” is the “Budget” for “Parks”. When it isn’t, they hear a stream of numbers.
Heading styles
Word’s and Google Docs’ built-in styles for headings: Heading 1, Heading 2 and so on. They tell software which lines are headings, which is what lets screen reader users jump between sections, and what builds the navigation pane and the table of contents. Text that’s only made big and bold isn’t a heading to anything but the eye.
Reading order
The order in which a screen reader reads a document. In a simple document it’s the order on the page. Text boxes, floating pictures and shapes sit outside that flow and can be read out of order, or skipped.
Screen magnifier
Software that enlarges part of the screen, used by many people with low vision. Windows and macOS both have one built in. A document that keeps its text as real text, in one column, stays readable when enlarged; a scanned page or a picture of text turns blurry.
Screen reader
Software that reads what’s on screen aloud, or sends it to a braille display, for people who are blind or have low vision, and others. Common ones are JAWS and NVDA on Windows, VoiceOver on Apple devices and TalkBack on Android. Screen reader users move through a document by headings, links, lists and tables, which is why those need to be real.
Tagged PDF
A PDF that carries a hidden map of its structure: which text is a heading, a list, a table or a picture’s alt text, and what order to read it in. Screen readers depend on those tags. Word makes a tagged PDF if you save with the accessibility option turned on. Printing to PDF, or scanning, makes an untagged one.
Text box
A box of text that floats over the page, separate from the main flow. Text boxes are a common cause of reading-order problems, and some tools skip them. Use paragraphs, headings and paragraph shading instead.
WCAG
The Web Content Accessibility Guidelines, published by the W3C, the body that sets web standards. Despite the name, they’re widely applied to documents too.
Each guideline has testable rules called success criteria, at three levels: A (the minimum), AA (the level most organizations and rules aim for) and AAA (the highest, not expected for everything). WCAG 2.2 is the current version; a document that meets 2.2 AA also meets 2.1 AA.