Shopify ADA Compliance & Web Accessibility

Although the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) was originally written to address accessibility barriers in the physical world, it has increasingly been applied to websites and other digital experiences. Since 1996, the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) has consistently taken the position that the ADA applies to web content.

Although the ADA does not have technical standards for web accessibility, the DOJ has pointed to the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) as a reasonable standard of accessibility.

Shopify’s e-commerce platform offers a number of built-in accessibility tools and features to help you deliver an accessible, inclusive to every customer — and you can also use a number of third-party solutions (like AudioEye’s Automated Accessibility Platform and Expert Audits) to further test your site against the latest accessibility standards and best practices.

There are a number of online resources to help website owners quickly evaluate whether their shopify website is compliant. At AudioEye, our free Website Accessibility Checker can help you check your website against WCAG 2.1 (the current accessibility standard referenced by the ADA and other nondiscrimination laws).

We also offer expert human testing by members of the disability community, who help test the functionality of e-commerce websites using assistive technology like screen readers. Doing so helps us identify additional accessibility violations and user experience issues, including issues with keyboard navigation, missing or nondescript alternative text, color contrast issues, and more.

Regularly testing your website against the latest accessibility standards is the best way to reach Shopify compliancy. At AudioEye, we recommend a mix of automated accessibility testing (which can identify many common accessibility violations) and expert human testing (which can identify usability issues and accessibility violations that cannot be detected by automation alone).

In recent years, the U.S. Department of Justice and other courts have consistently ruled that accessibility laws like the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) apply to both the physical and digital worlds — making digital accessibility a priority for any e-commerce site that wants to reduce their legal risk.

The Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) are a series of web accessibility guidelines published by the World Wide Web Consortium. 

Shopify offers a number of accessible themes and recommendations on how to make your online store more accessible to people with disabilities, including visual impairments, hearing impairments, and motor impairments.