WCAG 2.2 Compliance Checklist (2026)

WCAG 2.2 is the current version of the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines, the international standard most accessibility laws point to. If you’re trying to make a website accessible — or reduce legal risk under the ADA, Section 508, or the European Accessibility Act — this is the checklist to work from. Below we walk through the guidelines at Level AA (the level almost every regulation targets), grouped by WCAG’s four principles: Perceivable, Operable, Understandable, and Robust.

What “Level AA” actually means

WCAG defines three conformance levels: A (minimum), AA (the standard target), and AAA (enhanced). Laws and procurement rules overwhelmingly require AA. WCAG 2.2 added nine new success criteria on top of 2.1 — most notably around focus visibility, dragging alternatives, and target sizes — so a site that was “2.1 AA” is not automatically 2.2 AA.

Perceivable

• Text alternatives (1.1.1) — every meaningful image, icon, and control has descriptive alt text; decorative images use empty alt="".
• Captions & audio descriptions (1.2.x) — video has captions; pre-recorded media has an alternative for audio content.
• Info & relationships (1.3.1) — structure is conveyed in markup: real headings, lists, tables with headers, and programmatic form labels.
• Use of color (1.4.1) — color is never the only way information is conveyed (e.g. error states also use text or icons).
• Contrast (1.4.3 / 1.4.11) — text meets a 4.5:1 ratio (3:1 for large text); UI components and graphics meet 3:1.
• Reflow (1.4.10) — content reflows to a 320 CSS px width (≈400% zoom) with no loss of content or two-dimensional scrolling.
• Text spacing (1.4.12) — no content is clipped when users increase line height and letter/word spacing.

Operable

• Keyboard (2.1.1 / 2.1.2) — everything works with a keyboard alone, and focus is never trapped.
• Enough time (2.2.1) — time limits can be turned off, adjusted, or extended.
• Focus visible (2.4.7) — the keyboard focus indicator is always clearly visible.
• Focus not obscured (2.4.11) — new in 2.2 — a focused element isn’t hidden behind sticky headers or other content.
• Dragging movements (2.5.7) — new in 2.2 — any drag action has a single-pointer alternative (e.g. tap, click).
• Target size (2.5.8) — new in 2.2 — interactive targets are at least 24×24 CSS px (with spacing exceptions).
• Page titled & headings/labels (2.4.2 / 2.4.6) — each page has a descriptive title; headings and labels describe their purpose.

Understandable

• Language of page (3.1.1) — the lang attribute is set correctly.
• On focus / on input (3.2.1 / 3.2.2) — moving focus or changing a field doesn’t trigger an unexpected context change.
• Consistent help (3.2.6) — new in 2.2 — help mechanisms appear in a consistent order across pages.
• Error identification & suggestions (3.3.1 / 3.3.3) — errors are described in text and, where possible, a fix is suggested.
• Redundant entry & accessible authentication (3.3.7 / 3.3.8) — new in 2.2 — don’t make users re-enter information they already provided, and don’t require a cognitive test (like remembering a password) with no alternative.

Robust

• Parsing & name/role/value (4.1.2) — custom components expose a correct name, role, and state to assistive technology (usually via ARIA used correctly).
• Status messages (4.1.3) — dynamic updates (e.g. “item added to cart”) are announced without moving focus, using live regions.

What you can automate vs. what needs a human

Automated tools reliably catch the machine-checkable parts of this list — missing alt attributes, contrast failures, missing form labels, invalid ARIA, reflow problems, and keyboard reachability. They cannot judge whether alt text is meaningful, whether the reading order makes sense, or whether an error message is genuinely helpful. A realistic program pairs automated scanning (for fast, broad coverage) with manual and assistive-technology testing for the rest. We explain exactly where that line sits in our methodology.

Where to start

Don’t try to fix everything at once. Start by finding which of these criteria your site currently fails, prioritize the Critical and Serious issues that block real tasks (keyboard traps, missing labels, low contrast on key actions), and work down from there. The fastest way to get that prioritized list is to scan a representative page — your homepage, a key landing page, and a checkout or sign-up step. Have more questions first? See our FAQ.