TL;DR
- An accessible website opens up additional audiences, improves the user experience for everyone, and has a positive effect on your brand image.
- An accessibility checklist and specialized tools let you check where your website currently stands.
- So no criterion slips through, ganztags. supports you with a professional accessibility audit.
The German Accessibility Strengthening Act (Barrierefreiheitsstärkungsgesetz, BFSG) requires digital products and services to be accessible to everyone, regardless of visual, hearing, or motor impairments.
Even so, many websites still exclude these users today, often unintentionally, through missing alt text or poor contrast, for example.
In this post, we'll show you how to test your website for accessibility and give you a practical checklist to work with.
What does website accessibility actually mean?
According to the Web Accessibility Initiative (WAI) at the W3C, web accessibility means digital content is accessible and usable equally for everyone. That includes people with visual or hearing impairments, motor impairments, cognitive impairments, or other specific needs.
Accessibility on your website covers things like:
- Compatibility with a screen reader for blind or visually impaired users
- Simple navigation without a mouse, using only a keyboard or voice control
- High contrast and scalable font sizes for better readability
- Captions and alt text for videos and images
- Clear, understandable language without unnecessary jargon
Website accessibility: What does the law say?
Website accessibility has long since become more than a matter of user-friendliness. Since June 28, 2025, it's been a legal requirement in Germany.
The Accessibility Strengthening Act (BFSG) implements the requirements of the European Accessibility Act (Directive (EU) 2019/882). It's meant to improve access to digital products and services for people with disabilities and create a unified accessibility standard across the EU.
Requirements for an accessible website
The requirements for an accessible website derive from four core principles set out in the W3C's Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) 2.2. They make sure every user can access and use content without issues.
| Principle | What it means | Examples |
|---|---|---|
| Perceivable | Content must be perceivable through at least one sensory channel | Alt text for images, captions for videos, clear color contrast |
| Operable | The website must be fully operable without a mouse | Keyboard navigation, enough time for interactions, no flashing elements |
| Understandable | Content and operation must be clearly comprehensible | Simple language, consistent navigation, understandable forms |
| Robust | Content must work reliably across different technologies | Compatibility with browsers and assistive tools, standardized HTML, accessible PDFs |
Accessibility conformance levels
WCAG 2.2 also defines three conformance levels that indicate how thoroughly a website meets accessibility requirements.
| Level | What it means | Relevant for the BFSG |
|---|---|---|
| Level A | Minimum requirements, text alternatives for images, for example | Yes |
| Level AA | Recommended level for legal requirements, contrast, navigation aids, for example | Yes |
| Level AAA | Maximum accessibility, plain language, support for different learning styles, for example | No, only recommended |
Does my website need to be accessible?
Short answer: businesses that provide their products and services digitally need to make sure their website or app is accessible to everyone.
Affected industries include:
- E-commerce. Online shops, marketplaces, booking platforms
- Banks and financial services. Online banking platforms, payment services
- Mobility providers. Airlines, rail and bus companies with digital booking services
- Media and telecommunications. Streaming services, news sites, messenger and email services
- Technology and IT. Hardware manufacturers (smartphones, tablets, computers), software providers
Are there exceptions?
The BFSG does provide some exceptions for website accessibility:
- Micro-businesses with fewer than 10 employees and at most €2 million in annual revenue or balance sheet total are exempt from most requirements for services. This exception doesn't apply to a business's own products, self-manufactured devices, for example, under § 3(3) BFSG.
- Businesses that can prove a disproportionate economic burden can be exempted from certain requirements.
- B2B businesses that sell exclusively to other businesses don't need to ensure their website's accessibility.
Whether you're legally required to comply with the BFSG or not, every business should take website accessibility seriously. Here's why.
How your business benefits from an accessible website
An accessible website brings significant advantages, not just for users, but for your company too.
- Broader audience. You reach additional customers who were previously excluded, people with disabilities, older users, or people with temporary impairments, for example.
- Better user experience. Clear structure, simple navigation, and readable content make your website more pleasant for everyone. Users who find their way around quickly stay longer, convert more often, and come back more willingly.
- Indirect SEO benefit. Many accessibility measures, like alt text, semantic HTML, or clear structure, overlap with technical SEO. There's no official Google ranking factor called "accessibility," but the overlap often has a positive effect anyway.
- Legal certainty. The BFSG has been mandatory since 2025. Businesses that act early avoid warning notices and expensive retrofits.
- Competitive advantage. Many businesses wait until the last minute before implementing legal requirements. Acting now puts you a step ahead of the competition and lets you use accessibility as a real selling point.
Another upside: businesses that commit to inclusion get perceived as innovative, responsible, and customer-focused. That strengthens trust in the brand and makes you more attractive to customers, investors, and talent alike.
Testing your website for accessibility
Is your website accessible? Run a quick check.
1. Determine the current status
Use tools like WAVE or Google Lighthouse to identify technical barriers. Also test your website with a screen reader and try navigating it using only the keyboard.
2. Optimize your content
Based on your analysis, you should make technical, design, and content-level adjustments. These include, for example:
- clean HTML structure with semantic tags
- ARIA attributes
- high contrast and adjustable font sizes
- clearly recognizable buttons
- alt text for images and captions for videos
- clearly understandable copy
3. Test your website regularly
Accessibility is an ongoing process. Keep analyzing your website with suitable software like axe DevTools and the Contrast Checker. Ideally, get feedback directly from affected users too.
Website accessibility: Free checklist and template
We know building an accessible website takes effort and a lot of resources. To make that easier for you, we've put together a practical checklist and a Google Sheets template.
--> Get the Google Sheets template here! (just make a copy and get started)
To make sure your website meets every legal accessibility requirement, we can do a professional accessibility audit.
If you have further questions or need hands-on support with implementation, reach out through our contact form or on LinkedIn. We look forward to hearing from you!
Website accessibility: Frequently asked questions
Do I need to publish an accessibility statement for my website?
Yes, according to the BFSG, you need to provide an accessibility statement on your website that names the current state of implementation and a contact channel for feedback. This statement belongs on your accessibility checklist too, even if your website isn't fully compliant yet.
What happens if my website isn't accessible?
Violations of the BFSG can carry fines of up to €10,000, and up to €100,000 in more serious cases. Since January 2026, the states' market surveillance authority (Marktüberwachungsstelle der Länder, MLBF), based in Magdeburg, has been in its active enforcement phase. It checks mostly reactively, meaning based on complaints, supplemented by risk-based spot checks on sites with high reach or repeated violations.
What's the difference between accessibility and usability?
Usability aims at good operability for the average user, while accessibility makes sure people with visual, hearing, motor, or cognitive impairments can use your website fully too. In practice, the two overlap heavily. An accessible website is almost always the more user-friendly one too.
What types of impairments does digital accessibility cover?
Digital accessibility covers visual, auditory, motor, and cognitive impairments (e.g. blindness, hearing loss, limited fine motor skills, or reading and comprehension difficulties).
What are the 4 pillars of accessibility?
The 4 pillars of accessibility are perceivable, operable, understandable, and robust, set out in WCAG 2.2. Together, they form the foundation of every accessibility checklist.
How do I make a website accessible?
From alt text to form labels to consistent navigation: accessibility covers a lot of requirements that are easy to overlook in day-to-day work. That's exactly why a second look from the outside is worth it. Get in touch with us, and we'll test whether your website is on the safe side.
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