Web Accessibility Is Now the Law, Not a Nice-to-Have
For years, website accessibility was treated as an optional extra, something you got to eventually, after the design looked good and the deadline was met. That framing is now out of date. As of June 2025, accessibility became a legal requirement for a large group of businesses, and a year in, the conversation has shifted from “should we?” to “are we compliant?”
The driver is the European Accessibility Act, or EAA. Even if your business is not based in the EU, if you sell to European customers, this likely affects you. Here is a plain-language look at what it means for your website.
In a Nutshell…
- The European Accessibility Act became enforceable on 28 June 2025, turning accessibility into a legal obligation rather than a courtesy.
- It applies broadly to e-commerce, banking, ticketing, e-books, and many digital services sold to EU consumers, regardless of where the company is based.
- The technical baseline is essentially WCAG 2.1 Level AA, the same standard good agencies already build to.
- Penalties vary by country and can include fines and being ordered to stop selling until you comply.
- The good news: an accessible site is also faster, ranks better, and is easier for AI tools to read and recommend.
What the EAA Actually Requires
The EAA is an EU directive adopted back in 2019, with a deliberately long runway so businesses could prepare. That runway ended on 28 June 2025. It covers a wide range of products and services, but for most of our clients the relevant part is digital: online stores, booking and ticketing systems, banking interfaces, and e-books.
In practice, “accessible” is defined by a harmonised standard called EN 301 549, which leans heavily on the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) at Level AA. That is the same benchmark we already treat as the floor, not the ceiling.
There is a carve-out worth knowing: microenterprises that provide services (fewer than 10 staff and under 2 million euro turnover) are generally exempt from the service obligations. But that exemption is narrower than people assume, and it simply removes the legal stick, not the business case.
Who This Affects (Probably More People Than You Think)
The instinct is to assume this is an EU problem for EU companies. It is not. The act follows the customer, not the company. If someone in Germany or France can buy from your online store or use your booking system, you are within scope.
| If your site does this | The EAA likely applies |
|---|---|
| Sells products or services to EU consumers | Yes |
| Takes bookings or payments from the EU | Yes |
| Offers e-books or digital media in the EU | Yes |
| Only serves customers outside the EU | Not directly, but the standard is spreading |
Even for businesses fully outside its legal reach, accessibility is becoming the global default. Similar rules already exist in the US and Canada, and they are tightening.
How to Tell If Your Site Is at Risk
You do not need a lawyer for a first read. A handful of common failures account for most accessibility problems:
- Images without alt text, so screen readers describe nothing.
- Poor colour contrast, where light grey text on white looks elegant but is unreadable for many people.
- Forms without labels, which are impossible to complete without sight.
- Keyboard traps, where a user who cannot use a mouse gets stuck.
- Video without captions, locking out anyone who is deaf or hard of hearing.
A quick way to check is to run your site through a free automated tool like WAVE or the accessibility audit built into Chrome’s Lighthouse. These catch perhaps a third of issues, so treat a clean scan as a first signal, not a certificate.
Why This Is Good News, Not Just a Cost
It is easy to read all this as another compliance burden. We see it differently. Almost everything the EAA asks for also makes your site better for every visitor.
Accessible markup is clean, semantic markup, which is exactly what search engines and the new wave of AI answer engines reward. We covered this in getting recommended when customers ask AI: the same structure that helps a screen reader helps a model read and cite your content. Accessible sites also tend to be faster and clearer, which ties directly to why page speed matters and the conversion gains that come with it.
In other words, the work pays you back in reach, rankings, and trust. You are not spending money to satisfy a regulator. You are removing barriers between your business and a meaningful slice of customers, an estimated one in four adults in the EU lives with some form of disability.
Where to Start
If you are unsure whether your site meets the bar, the sensible first step is a proper audit, not a panic. We build every Pulsite site to WCAG 2.1 AA as standard, and we can review an existing site to tell you honestly where it stands and what it would take to close the gaps.
Ask us for an accessibility review → and we will give you a clear, jargon-free picture of where you are and what comes next.
This article is general information, not legal advice. For how the EAA applies to your specific business, consult a qualified professional. Want the related piece on speed? Read why page speed matters for your website.