Get started with screen reader scans in Accessibility Testing

Learn how to set up and run screen reader scans using the NVDA screen reader on Windows.

Screen reader scans use the NVDA screen reader on Windows to check your website for accessibility issues by simulating screen reader interactions.

How screen reader scans work

With screen reader scans, you can inspect how your a screen reader announces your website’s elements to users. Screen reader scan generates a report of the accessibility issues present in your websites.

This feature provides the following capabilities:

• Check if your website has screen-reader-accessible elements and components: Verify if all elements:
  • Have a meaningful speech output.
  • Are focusable by the screen reader.
  • Are interactable with the screen reader.
• Check if your website is functional for screen reader users across user workflows: Verify that you can navigate and interact with your website entirely using a screen reader.
• Check for screen reader accessibility regressions: Whenever you deploy a change to your website, run your screen reader scan tests to confirm the change hasn’t introduced new accessibility issues.

How to use screen reader scans

Follow these steps to perform a screen reader scan:

1. Log in to BrowserStack Accessibility Testing and click New Website Scan under Website Scanner.
2. Select from the Manual mode, Sitemap, or Crawler tabs.
3. Click the settings icon and set up your scan settings based on the mode you selected in step 2.
4. Select the Screen Reader checkbox from the available scan types. Select or clear other scan types to control what the report includes.
5. Click Create Scan.
   

BrowserStack Accessibility Testing generates a report based on your scan settings.

View screen reader scan output

You can view screen reader scan output in the BrowserStack Accessibility Testing dashboard. View the Screen Reader scan report page to get the detailed steps.