Improving Performance for Users with Disabilities in Web Development

Accessibility in web development ensures that websites and applications are usable by everyone, including persons with disabilities. A focus on performance optimization is closely entwined with accessibility enhancements to improve user experiences. Different legal frameworks govern web accessibility in terms of making digital content available to persons with disabilities. The most critical standards, among others, include WCAG (Web Content Accessibility Guidelines) and ADA (Americans with Disabilities Act).

WCAG (Web Content Accessibility Guidelines)

The WCAG was established by the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) through the Web Accessibility Initiative (WAI) to provide an international set of guidelines for ensuring that web content is accessible to persons with disabilities. It also helps in ensuring compliance with accessibility regulations.

The WCAG enables these by employing the following core principles:

Visibility and usability of content are important. Adding alt text to images and captions to videos can improve visibility.
Users must be able to navigate and interact with content without restriction. By providing keyboard accessibility and eliminating time constraints, this can be achieved.
Content must be precise and predictable. The text must be easy to read and navigate consistently.
Content must be compatible with assistive technologies such as screen readers and voice control.

It is the law in many countries that government websites and businesses or organizations that operate online and have a public audience should comply with these standards and guidelines for legal compliance.

ADA (Americans with Disabilities Act)

The ADA was established by the government of the U.S. in 1990 to aid individuals with disabilities. They sought to enact a law that ensured they were not discriminated against, which is why the ADA was implemented. Initially, the law concentrated on physical locations, but it has expanded to include digital spaces such as websites and applications. Although the ADA does not mention websites, courts in the United States have decided that websites are places of public accommodation and must be accessible. This disregard for the law has resulted in many companies being sued for not having accessible websites.

This law applies to all public organizations, businesses, and other service providers who deal with the general public. In particular, E-commerce, healthcare, education, and financial service sectors are most at risk regarding ADA violation claims.

Though different, WCAG and ADA still have one aspect in common. They enhance web usability and accessibility for disabled users.

Performance Optimization Techniques

To improve performance for users with disabilities, below are some performance optimization techniques to be considered:

Faster load times

Improving load times is one of the key performance optimization techniques that directly improves accessibility for users with disabilities. Websites that are too slow cause problems for those who use assistive technologies, such as screen readers, keyboard navigators, or voice commands. Two significant aspects that can enhance performance are the optimization of images and the reduction of JavaScript.

Image optimization: unoptimized images take time to load, and for users who use screen readers, having to wait can be frustrating. Slow visual loading is even more confusing for users who have cognitive difficulties. Furthermore, some impaired users who use assistive technologies with a poor internet connection or low-bandwidth networks may find it even more challenging to engage with visual content. For a better experience, users should be encouraged to utilize compressed formats that reduce file sizes, such as WebP and AVIF, without compromising quality. Enabling lazy loading of images so that non-visible content is loaded later is also advisable.
Minimizing JavaScript: heavy JavaScript can slow down page rendering and cause issues with assistive technologies. Screen readers struggle with dynamic content updates, there are delays in keyboard navigation due to excessive event listeners, and voice commands fail when scripts override default behaviors. The best ways to minimize JavaScript are to eliminate unnecessary scripts and remove unused JavaScript, use a lightweight framework instead of bulky libraries, and avoid excessive animations and pop-ups which can disorient users with cognitive disabilities to defer or asynchronously load scripts.

Using Semantic HTML and Accessible Rich Internet Applications (ARIA) improves performance and accessibility by making web navigation faster, more intuitive, and compatible with assistive technologies like screen readers, voice commands, and keyboard navigation.

Semantic HTML uses properly structured elements to define content, making it easier for browsers and assistive technologies to interpret and navigate a webpage efficiently. It is essential in rendering pages faster, improving the screen reader experience, and better keyboard navigation (defining interactive components, making them easy to focus on and operate).

ARIA provides additional accessibility information for assistive technology by adding more semantic information and improving dynamic and interactive elements. The use of aria-label for buttons, links, and navigation menus provides meaningful descriptions. It is also important to add role=”’ navigation” to <nav> elements to explicitly define navigation areas. Minimize ARIA overuse, and use native HTML elements whenever possible, as they are faster and better supported.

Reducing cognitive load

Reducing cognitive load is a crucial performance optimization technique that improves accessibility for users with cognitive disabilities, ADHD, dyslexia, and other processing challenges. It is important to reduce cognitive load because a complex website can overwhelm users with too much information at once, slow down navigation due to excessive elements or animations, and make comprehension difficult, leading to a frustrating experience. A streamlined design helps users process information quickly and efficiently, making interactions faster and more accessible.

Reducing cognitive load entails the following:

Use a clean layout with plenty of white space to avoid distractions.
Limiting color variations and avoiding unnecessary visual clutter.
Reduce animations that can cause confusion or motion sickness.
Ensuring a clear visual hierarchy (e.g., larger headlines and consistent button styles).
Use plain language and avoid jargon or complicated sentences.
Break text into paragraphs and use bullet points. Making short paragraphs makes it easier for the reader.
Use headings and subheadings (<h1>, <h2>, <h3>) to organize content logically.
Provide text alternatives for multimedia (e.g., captions, transcripts) for multimedia.
Use familiar UI patterns (e.g., standard menus and recognizable icons).
Ensure buttons and links are easy to identify and use.
Provide clear instructions for forms and interactive elements.
Minimize decision-making overload by limiting choices and steps.

By simplifying design, clarifying content, and optimizing navigation, websites reduce cognitive load, making them faster, more efficient, and accessible to all users. A clear, user-friendly interface benefits everyone, leading to a smoother and more inclusive web experience.

Accessible forms and inputs

Forms are essential user interfaces, and if they are poorly optimized, they can create a lot of accessibility barriers for disabled users. Accessibility and performance in forms improve usability for people using screen readers, keyboard navigation, and/or assistive technologies and subsequently improve site functionality within such technologies. Optimized accessible forms reduce loading time by removing unnecessary scripts and heavy UI objects, thereby increasing usability for disabled users by improving input efficiency and error prevention and reducing frustration by making fields easy to navigate and understand.

Responsive and Adaptive Design for Accessibility

Responsive and adaptive designs play a crucial role in web accessibility because they allow a seamless operation of websites across different devices and their assistive technologies. Adaptive device compatibility that includes scale fonts or contrast modes can create inclusive and user-oriented environments for people with disabilities as user experience design work would be completed by the developers.

Users with disabilities rely on various devices and assistive technologies to access the web, including:

Screen readers (e.g., NVDA, JAWS, Voiceover) for visually impaired users.
Speech recognition software (e.g., Dragon NaturallySpeaking) for users with mobility impairments.
Braille displays for individuals who are blind.
Keyboard-only navigation for users who cannot use a mouse.
Switch devices and eye-tracking software for users with motor impairments.

It creates hurdles for accessibility when a specific site seems incompatible with any of these technologies because it denies some users an effective way of interaction.

Some of the customizable features that could be helpful include adjustable text sizes, adjustable contrast settings, or alternative color schemes, which will come in handy for users with visual impairments, dyslexia, and cognitive disabilities. This adjustable feature is especially significant since users needing special text sizes for low vision will need large text, and users with color blindness will need a high-contrast color option to distinguish content. Some users with dyslexia will want customized fonts like OpenDyslexic, which help enhance the clarity of text, while some light-sensitive users may want to view their screens with reduced brightness or in a dark mode. Hence, every successful and accessible website should also be responsive and adaptive, meaning that websites should be adaptable on different devices and across different assistive technologies. By changeable font sizes, contrast modes, and user-controlled settings, an inclusively high-performing digital experience is created for each user, including those with disabilities.

Conclusion

Accessibility improves the high performance of the web to enable users with disabilities to navigate, interact with, and derive benefits from digital content. While developmental performance optimizations are intrinsically linked to accessibility, faster, well-structured, and flexible sites will be more usable for individuals accessing through assistive technologies, such as screen readers, keyboards, and speech recognition software. By relying on the right performance techniques, developers can eliminate numerous barriers that often hinder users with disabilities.

There are benefits to web performance isolation for achieving accessibility, including compliance with laws of the WCAG, ADA, and the like. It leads to a much better experience, involvement, and ranking in search engines. A well-integrated fast website with inclusiveness would not only serve users with disabilities but also serve every other user, making the web even more equitable and efficient, as accessibility, along with performance, constitutes inseparable aspects of modern web development. Implementing this in the design and development process would help us create a website that can be genuinely inclusive and can generate equal access to information and services for each user, irrespective of their ability or otherwise.