Web Accessibility

Many businesses treat web accessibility as a tedious checklist they must get through to avoid fines. That is a misunderstanding. Accessibility is quality work, and it benefits far more people than the small group with disabilities the checklist was written for.

When a website is accessible, the code is solid, the design is logical and the language is clear. The result works better for everyone: the blind user with a screen reader, the person with a broken arm who has to use the keyboard, and whoever is sitting on the bus with sunlight on the screen and forgot their glasses.

Web accessibility is good digital hygiene. It decides whether your solution excludes people or lets your entire market in.

Short answer: Yes, and the requirements are getting stricter.

Norway has long had some of the world's strictest regulations in this area. Through the Equality and Anti-Discrimination Act and the Regulation on Universal Design of ICT Solutions, all new ICT solutions aimed at the general public must meet accessibility standards.

Many assume these rules mainly apply to public sector organisations. That is changing. With the European Accessibility Act (EAA), which takes full effect in Norway in 2025/2026, the requirements tighten for the private sector as well.

This directive specifically targets products and services such as e-commerce (online stores), banking services, transport, e-books, and streaming services. If you operate an online store today and do not meet the requirements, you risk sanctions when the new rules take effect. Norway's Digitalisation Agency conducts inspections and can impose daily fines on businesses that fail to comply.

To measure whether a website is accessible, we use the international standard WCAG (Web Content Accessibility Guidelines). In Norway, the current requirement is WCAG 2.1 level AA (with 2.2 emerging as the new international standard).

This can sound technical, but it boils down to four straightforward principles:

1. Perceivable: Users must be able to access the content. That means good contrast for those with low vision, and text descriptions on images so screen readers can convey them.
2. Operable: Everything must be achievable with a keyboard. If the mouse or trackpad does not work (or the user has motor impairments), the site must still function fully.
3. Understandable: Navigation must be predictable, error messages must make sense, and language must be clear. A button should look like a button.
4. Robust: The code must be clean enough to work with assistive technologies (like screen readers) and across different browsers and devices.

Important: Automated testing tools only catch a fraction of the problems (roughly 20-30% of issues). Real compliance requires a human to test the solution manually.

We prioritize accessibility in all our projects. The law demands it, and it makes business sense:

1. You reach your entire market

In Norway, between 15% and 20% of the population has a disability. Add the ageing population on top of that. If your website does not work for these groups, you are sending every fifth customer straight to your competitor.

2. Google is your most important blind user

This is perhaps the strongest argument for marketers. Search engines like Google "see" your website the same way a screen reader does. They care about semantically correct code, logical heading hierarchy (H1, H2, H3), and good content descriptions. Good accessibility is often synonymous with good technical SEO.

3. The curb-cut effect

When lowered curbs were first built for wheelchair users, people discovered they were also excellent for parents with prams, travellers with rolling suitcases, and cyclists. The same applies digitally: sufficient contrast and clear language help those with low vision, and they help everyone reading on a mobile screen in sunlight just as much. Accessibility cleans up messy design and gives everyone a better user experience.

The market is flooded with "quick fixes" for accessibility. Avoid these:

• Overlay widgets ("Accessibility Overlays"): You may have seen icons of a wheelchair that open a menu to change contrast or font size. Many users and accessibility specialists warn against them. They rarely solve the underlying code problems and can make the site harder to use for people who already have their own assistive technology installed.
• Blind faith in automated tests: "We ran a scan and got a green light." Unfortunately, that does not mean the site is compliant. An automated test can check whether an image has a text description, but it cannot check whether that description makes sense.
• Treating it as the developer's job alone: Accessibility happens in three phases: Design (contrast, font size), Development (code, keyboard handling), and Content (clear language, video captions). If the designer delivers low contrast, the developer cannot "code it right."

We work directly in the code, whether you use React, Vue, WordPress, Optimizely, or Sanity. We believe in craftsmanship over shortcuts.

An accessibility statement is a legally required document that must be visible on your website. It should honestly communicate:

• How accessible is the website?
• Which known issues exist that have not been fixed yet?
• How can users report problems if they get stuck?

All public organisations must have this today. With the new EU directive, this requirement will extend to large parts of the private sector as well. It is no longer enough to say "we are working on it"; you must document it.

We help you through the entire process: from the technical assessment to filling out the form and meeting Digdir's requirements.

Read more about accessibility statements →

We adapt to your needs, whether you need a quick check, training, or a full renovation.

• Accessibility Audit: A thorough review of your website with an understandable report. We rank errors by severity so you know what is critical and what can wait.
• Development and Remediation: We point out the errors and then fix them. Our developers know how to refactor code so it becomes compliant without breaking the design.
• Training and Competence: Accessibility is perishable knowledge. We train your editors, designers, and developers. The goal is for you to maintain an accessible solution independently, without relying on consultants forever.
• Design Systems: We build accessibility into your design system from the start. That means buttons, colors, and forms are pre-approved before they are ever used on the website.

We differ from pure advisory firms in that we are developers and designers at our core. A PDF listing the problems is where advisory firms stop; we deliver working code.

We understand why the error occurred, and we know how to change the architecture to remove it permanently. Our approach is pragmatic: we fix the critical blockers first, then work systematically toward a solution that works well for all users.