What is an Assisted Test?

Identify complex accessibility issues by answering simple, auto-generated questions.

Assisted Tests help you run accessibility checks that can’t be reliably detected by automated methods. The extension analyzes the page or component that you are testing and asks you a guided series of questions that are easy to answer. Using such human input, Assisted Tests improve the accessibility coverage of your websites.

Why you should use Assisted Tests?

Assisted tests are designed to make thorough accessibility testing practical for every team member, not just specialists. You should use Assisted Tests when you want to:

• Go beyond automated checks and validate issues that need human judgment.
• Enable designers, developers, QA engineers, and product managers to contribute to accessibility without deep WCAG expertise.
• Build a repeatable process for checking key user flows and components, with results that you can review later in the Accessibility Testing Dashboard.

Importance of Assisted Tests

Assisted tests play a critical role in building and maintaining accessible experiences:

• Stronger WCAG coverage: Assisted tests validate areas where automated tools are weak, helping you move closer to WCAG 2.1 / 2.2 AA coverage for real user journeys.
• Cover more success criteria: Assisted tests help you cover more success criteria. They also uncover more issues on success criteria covered by automated tools.
• Reduced risk and rework: Guided questions help you uncover complex problems (for example, incorrect focus management or unclear error handling) before they cause usability issues or compliance risks.
• Better experience for assistive technology users: Many assisted test checks are designed around how screen reader, keyboard-only, and low-vision users actually interact with your product.
• Clear guidance for fixes: Each issue found by an assisted test is tied to a rule that explains what is wrong and how to fix it, making it easier for your team to act on the findings.

Success criteria covered by Assisted Tests

Each assisted test type targets specific accessibility success criteria and patterns. At a high level, Assisted Tests help you validate that:

• Forms and input errors have clear, persistent labels, correctly associated error messages, and logical grouping of related fields.
• Images and other non-text content use appropriate alternative text, avoid images of text where possible, and expose the right roles.
• Interactive elements such as buttons, links, and custom controls have correct accessible names, roles, and states.
• Keyboard navigation and focus are predictable, visible, and never trapped or moved in a way that breaks the user’s workflow.
• Page structure and layout use meaningful headings, landmarks, lists, and language attributes so assistive technologies can understand the page.
• Modals and dialogs manage focus correctly, support keyboard shortcuts such as Escape, and prevent content behind the dialog from interfering with the experience.
• Responsive behavior and zoom preserve access to content and functionality when users resize, zoom, or change orientation.
• Data tables expose proper headers, associations, and semantics so that relationships between data cells remain clear.

Some of the success criteria covered by Assisted Tests are also covered using Automated tests. The following table summarizes the success criteria covered by Assisted Tests:

For a complete list of rules and the detailed checks behind each area, see the rules for Assisted Tests.

Benefits of using Assisted Tests

The following are the benefits of using Assisted Tests:

Release accessible websites at speed

Quickly catch complex accessibility issues like an expert with Assisted Test technology. Your web pages are auto-scanned for issues and then you are prompted with an intuitive set of verifying questions, so you can build accessible experiences faster without slowing down releases.

Empower your team to pinpoint complex issues, regardless of skill level

Assisted tests make it easy for all types of users to identify complex accessibility issues. The guided workflow reduces the manual effort and expertise required, saving hours of time and reducing the frustration that often comes with traditional manual audits.

Types of Assisted Tests

You can perform the following types of Assisted Tests:

Forms Assisted Tests

The forms assisted test helps you verify the accessibility of form controls, including proper labeling, error handling, and grouping controls.

Images Assisted Tests

The images assisted test helps you identify and fix issues in the accessibility properties of images used in your web pages.

Interactive elements Assisted Tests

The interactive elements assisted test helps you identify issues in the accessibility properties of the interactive elements, such as accessible name, role, and state.

Keyboard Assisted Tests

The keyboard assisted test helps you check whether the keyboard tab stops are in a logical order.

Layout Assisted Tests

The layout assisted test helps you identify and fix accessibility issues in the structure and layout of your web pages.

Modals Assisted Tests

The modals assisted test helps you comprehensively check for accessibility issues in modals or dialog boxes on your web pages.

Responsiveness Assisted Tests

The responsiveness assisted test helps you identify and fix accessibility issues in your websites related to responsiveness, ensuring that your content is accessible across various devices and screen sizes.

Tables Assisted Tests

The tables assisted test helps you identify and fix accessibility issues in tables used in your web pages.

Next steps

• Run a Forms assisted test
• Run an Images assisted test
• Run an Interactive elements assisted test
• Run a Keyboard assisted test
• Run a Layout assisted test
• Run a Modals assisted test
• Run a Responsiveness assisted test
• Run a Tables assisted test