How to Make Your Website Screen Reader Friendly: A Practical Guide

Who This Guide Is For

You run a website, and you want to stop locking out people who use screen readers. This guide is for you. It’s not about legal checklists or corporate virtue signaling. It’s about fixing the specific things that break the experience for real users. The data is clear: roughly 1 in 4 U.S. adults has some disability (WebAIM), and globally over 2.5 billion people need assistive technology (WHO). If your site isn’t accessible, you’re ignoring a huge audience. Screen readers are the primary way many blind and low-vision users navigate the web. In a 2024 survey, 76.6% of screen reader users reported blindness, and 19.9% had low vision (WebAIM). So let’s get to work.

Start with the Right Mindset

First, understand what a screen reader is. It’s software that reads aloud the text and elements on a page, or outputs to a braille display (WebAIM). Users navigate with keyboard commands, jumping from heading to heading, link to link. That means your page structure matters more than you think.

Here’s the hard truth: 95.9% of home pages have detectable WCAG failures (WebAIM). The most common? Low contrast text, missing alt text, missing form labels, empty links, empty buttons, and missing document language. These six account for 96% of all detected errors (WebAIM). Fix those, and you’ve fixed most of the problem.

Don’t get overwhelmed. You don’t need to overhaul everything at once. Start with the big wins. I’ll walk you through the five steps that matter most.

Step 1: Give Every Image a Text Alternative

Open your page and look for images. Every image needs an alt attribute. That includes decorative images—use an empty alt (alt="") for those so screen readers skip them. But don’t skip informative images. The WebAIM Million found that 53.1% of home pages have missing alt text, and 45% of those missing are linked images (WebAIM). That means a user might click a link and have no idea where it goes.

Write alt text that describes the function or content. For a product photo, “Red running shoes” is fine. For a chart, describe the trend: “Bar chart showing sales increased 20% in Q3.” Keep it short. Don’t stuff keywords.

What can go wrong: If you ignore alt text, a screen reader will read the file name, like “IMG_2024.jpg.” That’s useless. And if the image is a link, the user hears “IMG_2024.jpg” and has no clue what it links to. That’s a dead end.

Step 2: Structure Your Pages with Headings

Screen reader users navigate by headings. In fact, 71.6% of them say they first look for headings when exploring a lengthy page (WebAIM). That means your page needs a logical heading hierarchy: one h1 for the main title, h2s for major sections, h3s for subsections, and so on. Don’t skip levels. Don’t use headings just to make text big—use CSS for that.

Here’s a quick checklist for your content:

• Use one h1 per page.
• Nest headings in order (h2 after h1, h3 after h2, etc.).
• Make headings descriptive: “How to Order” not “More Info.”

What can go wrong: If you use divs for everything and never add heading tags, a screen reader presents a wall of text with no landmarks. The user has to listen to everything from the top. That’s exhausting, and most will leave.

Step 3: Label Every Form Input

Forms are a common pain point. The WebAIM Million found that 51% of home pages have missing form labels (WebAIM). That means a user tabs to a text field and hears nothing—no clue what to type. You need a <label> for every input, and it must be programmatically associated using the for attribute.

Example: <label for="email">Email address</label><input type="email" id="email">

If you can’t use a visible label, use aria-label on the input. But visible labels are better for everyone.

What can go wrong: You use a placeholder like “Enter your email” but no label. Placeholders disappear when the user types, and screen readers may skip them. The user is left guessing. That’s a fail.

Step 4: Make Sure Link Text Says Where It Goes

Links should make sense out of context. “Click here” is useless. “Read our accessibility policy” is clear. Also, avoid empty links—those are links with no text at all, like an image without alt text that’s wrapped in an <a> tag. WebAIM found 46.3% of pages have empty links (WebAIM). That’s a lot of dead ends.

For linked images, the alt text acts as the link text. So make it descriptive. And if you have a button that’s an icon, give it an aria-label like “Search” so users know what it does.

What can go wrong: You have a row of social media icons that are just images with no alt text. A screen reader user hears “link, link, link” and has no idea which is which. They can’t use your site.

Step 5: Check Your Color Contrast and Language

Low contrast text is the most common error of all—83.9% of home pages have it (WebAIM). That means text that’s too light against its background. It’s hard to read for everyone, especially for the 2.2 billion people worldwide with vision impairment (WHO). Use a contrast checker tool to ensure your text meets WCAG AA standards (4.5:1 for normal text).

Also, set the language of your page in the HTML: <html lang="en">. That helps screen readers pronounce words correctly. 13.5% of pages miss this (WebAIM).

What can go wrong: You use a trendy light gray font on white. It looks sleek, but it’s unreadable. And if you don’t set the language, a screen reader might read English text with a French accent—if it even knows the language.

Sources

• WebAIM (Screen Reader User Survey) - https://webaim.org/projects/screenreadersurvey10/
• WebAIM Million - https://webaim.org/projects/million/
• World Health Organization (Assistive Technology) - https://www.who.int/news-room/fact-sheets/detail/assistive-technology
• World Health Organization (Blindness and vision impairment) - https://www.who.int/news-room/fact-sheets/detail/blindness-and-visual-impairment