You can’t conduct an accessibility audit without screen reader testing, but it’s important to know that testing with one screen reader doesn’t mean that there won’t be issues for another screen reader.
Put simply, some screen readers interpret code differently than others. Many times the differences are more nuances than anything material, but other times the differences are enough to rise to the point where one screen reader produces a different experience than another.
Most of our clients opt for both an audit that includes both desktop and mobile environments.
To ensure our audit spans the most popular environments, for desktop, we use:
- Chrome browser
- NVDA screen reader
- Windows OS
- PC laptop
For mobile, we use:
- Safari browser
- VoiceOver screen reader
- iOS
- Apple iPhone
That’s really good coverage (we’ve accounted for 2 of the 3 most popular screen readers) and provides for a very robust audit.
However, it doesn’t account for everything.
Clients are always welcome to opt for additional environments (e.g., add Android and TalkBack for mobile), but this takes additional time and comes at an additional cost. And, again, we’ve provided for a robust default audit.
This backed by data.
The WebAIM organization (creators of the popular WAVE scan) conducts screen reader surveys and in their most recent 2024 survey of 1539 participants, 40.5% answered said JAWS was their primary screen reader followed by 37.7% for NVDA and 9.7% for VoiceOver.
The next closest primary screen reader was Dolphin SuperNova at 3.7%.
But that’s not the end of the story. That’s just the primary screen reader for participants. Look at this next survey question:
“Which of the following desktop/laptop screen readers do you commonly use?”
- NVDA – 65.6%
- JAWS – 60.5%
- VoiceOver – 43.9%
- Narrator – 37.3%
- Orca – 8.3%
- ZoomText/Fusion – 7.5%
Here’s the same survey question for mobile:
“Which of the following mobile/tablet screen readers do you commonly use?”
- VoiceOver 70.6%
- TalkBack 34.7%
- Commentary/Jieshuo 10.1%
- Voice Assistant 6.0%
The key takeaway from this is that even though a few screen readers dominate the market, it’s not just those same screen readers that people use. Rather, people switch back and forth between a number of screen readers across various browsers.
This means that experiences can vary and there may be issues that result even after a digital asset has been fully audited and remediated.
It’s just the reality of digital accessibility and technology.
But this is why we define environments along with scope: so we can be certain of what environment combinations are clear of accessibility issues.
Plus, our default environments pack a wallop — our percentage uses are very high across the board.
If you’d like audit and/or user testing services for your digital asset, we’d love to help. Contact us or send us a message and we’ll be right with you.
