Accessibility
Online shops must be usable with assistive technology.
The store has to work with a screen reader and a keyboard: text alternatives for images, visible focus, sufficient contrast, labelled form fields, no keyboard traps, and an accessibility statement. Overlay widgets that inject fixes at runtime are contested and have drawn regulatory action; real remediation of the theme is the defensible path.
- Legal basis
- Directive (EU) 2019/882 (European Accessibility Act) · Germany: Barrierefreiheitsstärkungsgesetz (BFSG) · EN 301 549 / WCAG 2.1 AA as the technical benchmark · USA: ADA Title III case law
- Who it binds
- E-commerce services offered to consumers in the EU, from 28 June 2025. In the US, ADA litigation targets any public-facing site.
- Who is exempt
- Microenterprises providing services: fewer than 10 staff and at most €2 million turnover or balance sheet. Products and services already on the market have transition periods to 2030 in some cases.
- Penalty
- Set nationally. Germany's BFSG allows fines up to €100,000 and market-surveillance orders to take a service offline. In the US, settlements in ADA web cases typically run from $5,000 to $50,000 plus remediation.
Does the platform cover it?
| Platform | Native coverage | Note |
|---|---|---|
| Shopify | Partial | Recent Shopify themes ship with reasonable markup and focus handling, but conformance depends on theme customisation and merchant content. No native audit or statement. |
| WooCommerce | Partial | Depends entirely on the theme and block editor output. Core blocks are reasonably accessible; page builders often are not. |
| Wix | Partial | Wix has an accessibility wizard in the editor that flags issues, and its templates carry basic conformance. Merchant content and third-party apps are not covered. |
Apps on Shopify
| App | Price | Rating | Adoption | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Avada Accessibility ADA EAA | — | 5 | 317 | |
| ADA Accessibility Widget by AP | — | 4.9 | 97 | |
| TestParty: ADA Compliance | — | 5 | 27 |
Apps on WooCommerce
Apps on Wix
Check your store
A free scan reads the public pages of any shop on any platform and reports what it can and cannot find for this and related rules. Run the free check