Accessibility design is the consideration of users with disabilities or visual impairment and enabling these people to perceive, understand and interact with your page content. Accessibility is all encompassing and includes multiple factors such as usability and inclusivity. The more user-friendly, legible and aesthetically clean a design is, the better the page will perform. In terms of digital sustainability, this translates to less data transfer and ultimately a reduction in CO2. Accessibility design can be largely broken down to two core decisions:
1. What colours should I use?
A sustainable digital colour palette should maintain a high contrast ratio for greater readability and therefore accessibility. Colour accessibility should be one of the first considerations when building a sustainable brand. Energy efficiency is another conscious choice a designer can make when it comes to colour. Darker colours require less energy to illuminate your screens, with black being the most energy efficient and white the most intensive (5). This is only applicable to OLED screens though!
2. What fonts should I use?
This typically boils down to custom web fonts versus system fonts. Custom web fonts will increase your page size and in turn your load speed. System fonts are already universally recognised by devices and browsers and so less energy is required to load them. Custom font usage is often determined by brand governance, however if a choice is available, then system fonts are a more sustainable option, despite being less aesthetically pleasing!
