Today, an effective website isn’t just about good design and fast performance. It must also be accessible to everyone—a growing legal and ethical priority that is often overlooked. Web accessibility ensures that all users, including those with disabilities, can navigate, understand, and interact with your website content.
What Is Web Accessibility?
Web accessibility is about making digital content usable by all people, regardless of disability—permanent, temporary, or age-related. This includes, for example:
- A blind user navigating with a screen reader,
- Someone with motor disabilities relying solely on keyboard navigation,
- A color-blind visitor who needs high-contrast interfaces,
- An elderly person experiencing reduced vision, dexterity, or cognitive speed,
- Or anyone temporarily affected by situational limitations (e.g. a broken arm, noisy environment, poor network conditions).
These users represent millions of potential visitors. Ignoring accessibility means excluding a significant portion of your audience.
Key Standards: WCAG & RGAA
To define and measure accessibility, several standards are used:
- WCAG (Web Content Accessibility Guidelines): The global reference standard, developed by the W3C, based on four principles: Perceivable, Operable, Understandable, and Robust. It includes three levels: A, AA (the most common), and AAA.
- RGAA (Référentiel Général d’Amélioration de l’Accessibilité): France’s official accessibility framework, aligned with WCAG, and mandatory for public sector websites.
Many companies today also follow these guidelines voluntarily to improve usability and meet legal expectations.
Core Best Practices for Accessibility
To create accessible websites, here are a few foundational practices:
- Use semantic HTML structure (headings, landmarks, navigation regions)
- Provide alternative text for all images
- Ensure sufficient color contrast between text and background
- Make all interactive elements keyboard navigable
- Show a visible focus indicator for keyboard navigation
- Add clear labels and instructions for form fields
- Declare the language of the content properly
- Avoid components that rely only on mouse or touch gestures
The goal is to reduce any cognitive or physical barrier to access.
Accessibility in Magento 2: The Reality
Magento 2’s default themes (Luma and Blank) are not fully compliant with accessibility standards out of the box. Common issues include:
- Poor contrast in some elements,
- Incomplete keyboard navigation,
- JavaScript components (like sliders, dropdowns) that aren’t accessible by default,
- Inconsistent semantic structure in the HTML.
For e-commerce brands, these gaps impact both user experience and legal risk, especially as accessibility laws become stricter.
Where Breeze Comes In
The Breeze theme for Magento 2, offers a modern, performance-focused frontend that’s also more accessibility-friendly.
Some key advantages of Breeze:
- Cleaner, more semantic HTML structure than Luma,
- Lightweight and customizable CSS/JS, making accessibility adjustments easier,
- Fewer complex JavaScript dependencies (no Knockout.js), simplifying accessible interactions,
- Easier integration of accessible components (keyboard menus, focus states),
- A better foundation for WCAG and RGAA compliance from day one.
Of course, no theme is 100% accessible out of the box. Accessibility requires ongoing effort, tailored to your audience and your site’s specific needs. But Breeze offers a far better base to build inclusive, performant Magento sites.
In Conclusion
Web accessibility isn’t optional—it improves UX for all users, boosts SEO and performance, and ensures legal compliance. With modern tools like Breeze for Magento 2, and by following accessibility standards like WCAG or RGAA, we can build online stores that are inclusive, sustainable, and user-focused.