Does my website have to be accessible?
If you sell to consumers online and have ten or more employees, or more than two million euros in both turnover and balance sheet total: yes, since 28 June 2025. Smaller businesses are exempt. If the rule applies to you, your site must be usable without a mouse, with a screen reader and with enlarged text, and you keep it that way.
- Product photo without alt textDirective (EU) 2019/882, the EAA
Directive (EU) 2019/882, the EAA
Checked at the source on 27 September 2026.
Who it applies to
Providers of e-commerce services: websites and apps where a consumer can buy, order, book or sign up for something at a distance, even if only on part of the site. Micro-enterprises are exempt: fewer than ten employees, and an annual turnover or balance sheet total of at most two million euros. In the EU, 98.3 per cent of retailers selling outside a shop have fewer than ten people working (Eurostat, 2023).
- Just me
- Usually notBelow ten people you are exempt, unless both your turnover and your balance sheet total exceed two million euros.
- 2 to 9
- Usually notBelow ten people you are exempt, unless both your turnover and your balance sheet total exceed two million euros.
- 10 or more
- Under a conditionYes, if you sell to consumers or provide services to them online.
What the law asks
Art. 2(2)(f) and 4(3) EAA
Anyone providing e-commerce services to consumers provides them according to the accessibility requirements of the European Accessibility Act, Directive (EU) 2019/882.
Art. 13 EAA
You describe how your service meets the requirements, make that information available in an accessible way, and have procedures that keep the service compliant, including when your site or the standards change. If something does not comply, you put it right straight away.
Art. 4(5) and 14 EAA
Micro-enterprises that provide services are exempt: fewer than ten employees and an annual turnover or balance sheet total of at most two million euros. And the requirements do not apply insofar as they would fundamentally change the service or impose a disproportionate burden.
National law
The Netherlands in article 6:230fb of the Civil Code, Germany in the Barrierefreiheitsstärkungsgesetz (BFSG), France in article L412-13 of the Code de la consommation. The Dutch regulator ACM uses WCAG 2.1 at level AA as the benchmark and advises working with WCAG 2.2 already. A certificate or audit is not mandatory; an accessibility statement that is easy to find is.
Check it yourself, in five minutes
- Go through your checkout with the Tab key only. Can you always see where you are, and can you pay without a mouse?
- Zoom your browser to 200 per cent. Does everything stay readable without scrolling sideways?
- Check that your product photos have a description that says what can be seen.
- Is light grey text on white still easy to read, even on a phone in the sun?
- Is there an accessibility statement on your site, and can it be found from every page?
What our scan sees
- Seventy WCAG rules at level A and AA that a machine can establish, per page, on desktop and on mobile.
- Four tests axe-core does not do: sideways scrolling at 320 pixels, visible and obscured focus with real tab presses, and wider text spacing.
- For every finding, the element, the HTML, who can fix it and how.
What our scan does not see
- Some sixty to seventy per cent of the criteria need a person: whether an alt text is right, whether the reading order is logical, whether an order can be placed with a screen reader.
- How many people work for you, and so whether the rule applies to you.
- Whether your accessibility statement is complete.
Who enforces it
The market surveillance authority for accessibility in your country: in the Netherlands the ACM, in Germany the market surveillance authorities of the Länder, in France the DGCCRF. If your service does not comply, you report that to the authority, and you remain responsible, even if someone else built your site.
Questions
Can an accessibility widget solve it?
No. Such a widget lays a layer over your site and does not change your source code. The US Federal Trade Commission fined the best-known vendor 1 million dollars in 2025 over its claims. We point out the problem in your own code, with the change that fixes it.
If the scan finds nothing, am I compliant?
No. A machine can establish some thirty to forty per cent of the criteria. A clean report means it found nothing, not that someone with a screen reader can order from you.
Read it yourself
- Directive (EU) 2019/882, the European Accessibility Act (opens in a new tab)
The full text, with the requirements in Annex I.
- WCAG 2.2 (opens in a new tab)
The guidelines themselves, from the W3C.
See where your site stands
The free scan measures this and the four other rules in one go, from a European address, without clicking anything.