At the success criteria level as per the W3C ATAG report tool, pass/fail:
At the success criteria level, by level of conformance:
At the guidelines level as per the W3C Authoring Tools list, with partial support:
See Implementing A.1.1.
(Level A / AA / AAA). See Implementing A.1.1.1.
Fail. Evaluated as: Level AA. Wagtail currently targets WCAG 2.2 AA and ATAG 2.0 AA conformance for the administrative interface of the CMS. Though a lot of progress has been made, there are still known conformance issues and possible improvements.
As a representation of the state of Wagtail’s WCAG 2.1 AA conformance, here is a summary of WCAG 2.2 AA and best practice issues across releases, for the page editor UI (tested with Welcome to the Wagtail bakery!):
Version | Total | Color contrast | nested-interactive |
aria-valid-attr-value |
aria-input-field-name |
Links purpose | Empty heading | Heading order | region |
Landmark unique |
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
6.3 | 2 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 2 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
6.2 | 2 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 2 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
6.1 | 2 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 2 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
6.0 | 2 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 2 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
5.2 | 6 | 2 | 0 | 1 | 2 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 1 |
5.1 | 6 | 2 | 0 | 1 | 2 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 1 |
5.0 | 7 | 2 | 0 | 1 | 2 | 2 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
4.2 | 13 | 8 | 0 | 1 | 2 | 2 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
4.1 | 12 | 7 | 0 | 1 | 2 | 2 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
4.0 | 7 | 1 | 0 | 1 | 2 | 2 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
3.0 | 24 | 16 | 0 | 2 | 2 | 2 | 1 | 1 | 0 | 0 |
2.16 | 30 | 16 | 3 | 3 | 2 | 2 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 0 |
Suggested next steps:
References:
Full list of 21 currently-documented accessibility issues in GitHub:
There have been 19 issues fixed since the last ATAG 2.0 audit:
See Implementing A.1.2.
(Level A). See Implementing A.1.2.1.
Not applicable. Wagtail is a web-based CMS.
(Level A). See Implementing A.1.2.2.
Not applicable. Wagtail is a web-based CMS.
See Implementing A.2.1.
(Level A). See Implementing A.2.1.1.
Fail. For icons within the CMS, all have appropriate alt text. For CMS-managed images, Wagtail renders non-text content in nine scenarios, five of which are related to editing views and would require changes:
aria-labelledby
.alt=""
, with title displayed after the image.aria-labelledby
.alt=""
, with title displayed after the image, and custom field further down.aria-labelledby
, or a combination of it and aria-describedby
.aria-labelledby
.alt=""
, with no text displayed near the image.aria-labelledby
.Outside editing views (possibly not part of ATAG requirements), Wagtail renders images in the following scenarios:
alt
attribute.aria-labelledby
associations.description
field as alt text.alt
attribute.aria-labelledby
associations.description
field as alt text.figcaption
.
alt=""
, but the image is within a figure
with the image’s title as figcaption
.aria-labelledby
.description
field as alt text.Recommendation for Wagtail: Consider how best to sign-post the Description field as the image’s alt text in the CMS, and potentially also in the frontend (with clear options to mark images as decorative or define alt text in context).
Reference: RFC 97: Alt Text Capabilities.
(Level A). See Implementing A.2.1.2.
Fail. Wagtail’s only time-based media is animated GIFs. Their text alternatives work identically to other images in Wagtail, with the same characteristics listed in SC A.2.1.1.
See Implementing A.2.2.
(Level A). See Implementing A.2.2.1.
Fail. Wagtail uses the following status indicators in editing views:
aria-describedby
(“Character count: 18/120”).
aria-label
and tooltip on the status button.Outside editing views (possibly not part of ATAG requirements), Wagtail renders status indicators in the following scenarios:
(Level AA). See Implementing A.2.2.2.
Not applicable. Wagtail doesn’t allow editing of any text properties associated with the content.
See Implementing A.3.1.
(Level A). See Implementing A.3.1.1.
Fail. Though the majority of the authoring tool’s functionality is keyboard accessible, there are specific areas that aren’t:
(Level A). See Implementing A.3.1.2.
Pass. There are no known keyboard traps in the administrative interface.
(Level AA). See Implementing A.3.1.3.
Pass. The administrative interface provides the following mechanisms to improve keyboard navigation:
(Level AAA). See Implementing A.3.1.4.
Fail. See A.3.1.1 Keyboard Access. We would expect addressing all aspects listed in A.3.1.1 to also address this criterion.
(Level AAA). See Implementing A.3.1.5.
Fail. None of Wagtail’s keyboard commands can be customized.
Proposed actions:
(Level AAA). See Implementing A.3.1.6.
Pass. Across specific areas:
Proposed actions:
See Implementing A.3.2.
(Level A). See Implementing A.3.2.1.
Fail. Wagtail doesn’t provide auto-save functionality. For Wagtail sites, the default session time limit is 2 weeks. See Autosave #24 on the Wagtail roadmap.
(Level A). See Implementing A.3.2.2.
Pass. For Wagtail sites, the default session time limit is 2 weeks.
(Level A). See Implementing A.3.2.3.
Pass. There are no moving input components in the CMS.
(Level AAA). See Implementing A.3.2.4.
Fail. Wagtail doesn’t provide auto-save functionality. See A.3.2.1 Auto-Save (Minimum). We expect the same approach to be followed for both SCs.
See Implementing A.3.3.
(Level A). See Implementing A.3.3.1.
Fail. Animated GIFs auto-play when rendered, with no option to pause them.
Proposed actions:
See Implementing A.3.4.
(Level AA). See Implementing A.3.4.1.
Not applicable. Markup elements aren’t exposed in the CMS.
(Level AAA). See Implementing A.3.4.2.
Pass. The only editable programmatic relationships are headings and element nesting in rich text fields, which can be navigated via the keyboard.
See Implementing A.3.5.
(Level AA). See Implementing A.3.5.1.
Fail. Wagtail supports browsers’ built-in text search which meets all criteria, but only allows searching within the currently-active tab of the editing view. For example, for pages, content under the “Promote” tab will only be searchable when this tab is active.
Proposed actions:
See Implementing A.3.6.
(Level A). See Implementing A.3.6.1.
Pass. All of Wagtail’s UI settings can be adjusted without modifying the content.
(Level AA). See Implementing A.3.6.2.
Pass. Specific settings are saved differently. The following settings are persistent for a given user profile, across all sessions of said user:
The following settings are persistent for a given browser, across all sessions within said browser:
(Level AA). See Implementing A.3.6.3.
Pass. Wagtail’s language, time zone, and theme settings default to respecting platform settings until set to a specific value by the user.
See Implementing A.3.7.
(Level A). See Implementing A.3.7.1.
Pass. Wagtail’s live preview for pages and snippets and its draft renders within the user’s browser.
(Level AAA). See Implementing A.3.7.2.
Pass. Wagtail’s live preview for pages and snippets can only display within the user’s browser, but all saved draft content can be previewed in any browser/device the user is logged in.
See Implementing A.4.1.
(Level A). See Implementing A.4.1.1.
Fail. Though a large number of authoring actions are reversible, not all are. The following actions are reversible:
The following actions are not reversible but do require confirmation to proceed:
The following actions are not reversible and do not require confirmation to proceed:
(Level A). See Implementing A.4.1.2.
Pass. All of Wagtail’s UI settings saved at the browser level can be reversed by the user directly within the UI. All of the settings saved at the user profile level can be set to an “unset” default value.
Recommendation for Wagtail:
(Level AAA). See Implementing A.4.1.3.
Pass. Reversible plain text and rich text content changes can be reversed sequentially while the user remains on the page. Content supporting revisions can be restored at any point in the content’s history.
See Implementing A.4.2.
(Level A). See Implementing A.4.2.1.
Pass. The following functionality would be used to meet Part A and needs to be described either in the documentation or in the user interface:
The following functionality is described in the user interface:
The following functionality is described in the documentation:
The following functionality is provided by the underlying platform:
(Level AA). See Implementing A.4.2.2.
Fail. Here is a high-level record of whether given functionality is documented. As a summary:
This record does not cover functionality provided by the underlying platform (for example; automated embed creation) or unused by authors.
Functionality | Documented? |
---|---|
Global | Partial |
Skip link | Yes |
No-JS warning message | No |
Sidebar | Yes |
Header | No |
Messages | No |
Relative date | No |
Status tag | Yes |
Table listing | No |
Pagination | No |
Dashboard | Yes |
Unauthorized access (403) | No |
Page not found (404) | No |
Accessibility checker | No |
Wagtail userbar | No |
Pages | Partial |
Pages explorer | Yes |
Add child page | Yes |
Page type usage | Yes |
Privacy | Yes |
Move pages | No |
Copy | Yes |
Delete | No |
Publish | No |
Unpublish | No |
View all revisions | Yes |
Compare revisions | No |
Review revision | Yes |
Create | Yes |
Edit | Yes |
Edit - Promote tab | No |
Preview | No |
Scheduled publishing | Yes |
Explorer - Bulk actions | Yes |
Explorer - Bulk move | No |
Explorer - Bulk delete | No |
Explorer - Bulk publish | No |
Explorer - Bulk unpublish | No |
Explorer - View child pages | Yes |
Explorer - View child pages - Reorder child pages | No |
Explorer - View child pages - Sort by column | No |
Explorer - Root level | No |
Search | Yes |
Search - Filtered | No |
Images | Partial |
View all | No |
Search | No |
Search - Filtered | No |
Edit | Yes |
Add an image | No |
Add multiple images | No |
Delete | No |
Image URL generator | No |
Bulk actions | Yes |
Bulk add tags | No |
Bulk add to collection | No |
Bulk add delete | No |
Documents | Partial |
View all | No |
Search | No |
Search - Filtered | No |
Edit | Yes |
Add a document | No |
Add multiple documents | No |
Delete | No |
Bulk actions | Yes |
Bulk add tags | No |
Bulk add to collection | No |
Bulk add delete | No |
Snippets | Partial |
View all types | Yes |
View all | No |
Search snippets | No |
Edit | Yes |
Add | No |
Delete | No |
Bulk delete | No |
Publish | No |
Unpublish | No |
Preview | No |
Scheduled publishing | No |
View all revisions | No |
Compare revisions | No |
Review revision | No |
Forms | No |
View all | No |
View submissions | No |
Reports | Yes |
Locked Pages | Yes |
Workflows | Yes |
Workflow tasks | Yes |
Site history | Yes |
Aging pages | Yes |
Page types usage | Yes |
Workflows | Partial |
View all | Yes |
Add | No |
Usage | No |
Edit | Yes |
Workflow tasks | Partial |
View all | Yes |
Add | Yes |
Edit | No |
Disable | No |
Users | Partial |
View all | Yes |
Search | No |
Edit | No |
Edit - Edit roles | No |
Add | No |
Add - Add roles | No |
Delete | No |
Bulk actions | Yes |
Bulk delete | No |
Bulk set active state | No |
Bulk assign role | No |
Groups | No |
View all | No |
Search | No |
Add a group | No |
Edit | No |
Delete | No |
Group users | No |
Sites | No |
View all | No |
Edit | No |
Add a site | No |
Delete | No |
Locales | No |
View all | No |
Edit | No |
Add a locale | No |
Delete | No |
Collections | Partial |
View all | Yes |
Edit | No |
Add a collection | Yes |
Privacy | Yes |
Redirects | Yes |
View all | Yes |
Search | Yes |
Import redirects | Yes |
Add | Yes |
Export Redirects | Yes |
Edit | Yes |
Delete | Yes |
Promoted search | Yes |
View all | Yes |
Search | Yes |
Edit | Yes |
Add results | Yes |
Delete | Yes |
User account | Yes |
Account profile | Yes |
Account notifications | Yes |
Styleguide | No |
Styleguide | No |
Auth | No |
Login | No |
Password reset | No |
Password reset done | No |
See Implementing B.1.1.
(Level A / AA / AAA). See Implementing B.1.1.1.
Pass. Evaluated as: Level AAA. Wagtail doesn’t automatically generate content after authoring sessions. Processes that operate after authoring sessions and could alter the content are scheduled publishing and search index updates, but in both cases any automatically-generated content would already be present during the session.
(Level A / AA / AAA). See Implementing B.1.1.2.
Pass. Evaluated as: Level AA. Wagtail automatically generates content in a few scenarios. In the following scenarios, markup is accessible without further work:
Proposed actions:
See Implementing B.1.2.
(Level A / AA / AAA). See Implementing B.1.2.1.
Not applicable. Evaluated as: Level AA. The only transformation present in Wagtail is processing of clipboard paste information in rich text fields to sanitize the content, which preserves accessibility semantics for preserved content, but isn’t considered a content transformation per ATAG.
If it was considered a content transformation – rich paste processing preserves all formatting supported in rich text fields. Heading levels, bullet lists, and image alt text are preserved in particular.
(Level A / AA / AAA). See Implementing B.1.2.2.
Pass. Evaluated as: Level AA. Wagtail supports copy-paste of rich text content, which is fully preserved when copy-pasting between fields configured to support the same formatting. Fields configured differently will accordingly have their formatting stripped as needed.
(Level A). See Implementing B.1.2.3.
Not applicable. Wagtail doesn’t perform any optimizations that would affect accessibility.
(Level A). See Implementing B.1.2.4.
Not applicable. See B.1.2.1 Restructuring and Recoding Transformations (WCAG).
See Implementing B.2.1.
(Level A / AA / AAA). See Implementing B.2.1.1.
Fail. Evaluated as: Level AA. Wagtail places extensive restrictions on the production of web content, which all nonetheless allow for the production of accessible content, with the exception of:
lang
attributes within rich text. This could be worked around by using other types of content modeling for multilingual content, which is possible but unlikely.Proposed actions:
See Implementing B.2.2.
(Level A / AA / AAA). See Implementing B.2.2.1.
Pass. Evaluated as: Level AA. Where text styling options are available, they are presented alongside semantic formatting options such as headings. This is for example the case in rich text formatting options.
For StreamField block formats, the order is up to each site implementer to decide on. There are no built-in formats that are automatically included.
(Level A / AA / AAA). See Implementing B.2.2.2.
Not applicable. Evaluated as: Level AAA. Wagtail doesn’t support setting web content attribute values. This has been discussed extensively for links, as well as an option to set aria-label
, but hasn’t been implemented yet.
See:
See Implementing B.2.3.
(Level A / AA / AAA). See Implementing B.2.3.1.
Pass. Evaluated as: Level AA. All areas where images can be used support providing alt text. This includes:
(Level A). See Implementing B.2.3.2.
Pass. Wagtail doesn’t attempt to repair text alternatives. It does use the image’s file name as the default value for the image’s title field when creating a new image, which is used for alt text, but this is part of the upload/editing process (In-Session Repairs) and not an automated process. Said file name is filtered by default to remove the file extension.
(Level AAA). See Implementing B.2.3.3.
Fail. By default, Wagtail saves each image’s text alternative and reuses it everywhere the image is reused (“Save and Suggest”). It is possible to replace this text alternative with a new one, but it isn’t possible to delete it.
Suggested action: incorporate this requirement into the contextual alt text support.
See Implementing B.2.4.
(Level A / AA / AAA). See Implementing B.2.4.1.
Fail. Evaluated as: Level AA. With rich text formatting and StreamField blocks, Wagtail provides templates for basic text content as well as complex formatting like tables. Wagtail also provides templates for form fields within its forms module. Specific templates have accessibility issues.
Note: Blockquote formatting does not support the optional blockquote cite
attribute or <cite>
element.
Template | Accessibility issues with output |
---|---|
CharBlock | None |
TextBlock | None |
EmailBlock | None |
IntegerBlock | None |
FloatBlock | None |
DecimalBlock | None |
RegexBlock | None |
URLBlock | None |
BooleanBlock | None |
DateBlock | None |
TimeBlock | None |
DateTimeBlock | None |
RichTextBlock | None |
RawHTMLBlock | None |
BlockQuoteBlock | None |
ChoiceBlock | None |
MultipleChoiceBlock | None |
PageChooserBlock | None |
DocumentChooserBlock | None |
ImageBlock | None |
ImageChooserBlock | None |
SnippetChooserBlock | None |
EmbedBlock | None |
TableBlock | None |
TypedTableBlock | None |
Note: BlockQuoteBlock does not support the optional blockquote cite
attribute or <cite>
element.
Structural block types do not render any content and as such have no accessibility issues.
Template | Accessibility issues |
---|---|
StaticBlock | None |
StructBlock | None |
ListBlock | None |
StreamBlock | None |
All form builder fields suffer from the same issue: Error messages aren’t programmatically associated with the field.
Template | Accessibility issues |
---|---|
Single line text | Errors association with fields. |
Multi-line text | Errors association with fields. |
Errors association with fields. | |
Number | Errors association with fields. |
URL | Errors association with fields. |
Checkbox | Errors association with fields. |
Checkboxes | Errors association with fields. |
Drop down | Errors association with fields. |
Multiple select | Errors association with fields. |
Radio buttons | Errors association with fields. |
Date | Errors association with fields. |
Date/time | Errors association with fields. |
Hidden field | None |
This may be addressed in the future, via improvements in Django. See:
Proposed actions:
(Level AA). See Implementing B.2.4.2.
Pass. Wagtail’s template selection mechanism is the block chooser (or field chooser for form builder fields). In both cases, there would be no options defined unless configured by site implementers, which can customize block icons or labels / names to indicate accessible block types.
(Level AA). See Implementing B.2.4.3.
Not applicable. Wagtail doesn’t allow authors to create custom block templates.
(Level AAA). See Implementing B.2.4.4.
Fail. Some of Wagtail’s template options aren’t accessible. See B.2.4.1 Accessible Template Options.
See Implementing B.2.5.
(Level AA). See Implementing B.2.5.1.
Not applicable. Wagtail doesn’t provide pre-authored content.
(Level AA). See Implementing B.2.5.2.
Not applicable. Wagtail doesn’t provide pre-authored content.
See Implementing B.3.1.
(Level A / AA / AAA). See Implementing B.3.1.1.
Pass. Evaluated as: Level A. There are a number of formatting / content entry options in the CMS that can lead to accessibility issues. The built-in accessibility checker provides automated tests for a number of possible issues, but not all. Available checks are:
button-name
: <button>
elements must always have a text label.empty-heading
: This rule checks for headings with no text content. Empty headings are confusing to screen readers users and should be avoided.empty-table-header
: Table header text should not be emptyframe-title
: <iframe>
elements must always have a text label.heading-order
: This rule checks for incorrect heading order. Headings should be ordered in a logical and consistent manner, with the main heading (h1) followed by subheadings (h2, h3, etc.).input-button-name
: <input>
button elements must always have a text label.link-name
: <a>
link elements must always have a text label.p-as-heading
: This rule checks for paragraphs that are styled as headings. Paragraphs should not be styled as headings, as they don’t help users who rely on headings to navigate content.alt-text-quality
: A custom rule ensures that image alt texts don’t contain anti-patterns like file extensions and underscores.There are a number of success criteria that do not have automated checks nor instructions for manual checking:
Proposed actions:
(Level A). See Implementing B.3.1.2.
Not applicable. Currently all of Wagtail’s automated checks are pass/fail with no author input required. Discussion on further checks: Content quality checkers #11063
(Level A). See Implementing B.3.1.3.
Not applicable. Currently all of Wagtail’s automated checks are pass/fail with no author input required. Those checks do indicate which elements they are flagging. Proposed improvements:
(Level AA). See Implementing B.3.1.4.
Pass. Wagtail’s accessibility checker reports on the number of detected issues, and upon interaction lists all rules that detected problems and where on the page.
Possible improvements:
(Level AA). See Implementing B.3.1.5.
Fail. Currently the association isn’t programmatic, due to expected compatibility issues.
Possible resolution: Correct identification of Wagtail content so errors are only reported on CMS-managed content.
See Implementing B.2.3.
(Level A / AA / AAA). See Implementing B.3.2.1.
Fail. Evaluated as: Level A. Currently Wagtail’s 9 rules report the presence of a problem but do not suggest specific solutions.
Proposed improvements:
See Implementing B.4.1.
(Level A). See Implementing B.4.1.1.
Pass. Wagtail’s accessibility checker is on by default and cannot be turned off unless site implementers make CMS customizations in code.
(Level A). See Implementing B.4.1.2.
Pass. See B.4.1.1 Features Active by Default.
(Level AA). See Implementing B.4.1.3.
Pass. See B.4.1.1 Features Active by Default.
(Level AA). See Implementing B.4.1.4.
Pass. Wagtail currently has no features relating to invalid markup, syntax errors, spelling errors, grammar errors. Possible future changes:
See Implementing B.4.2.
(Level A / AA / AAA). See Implementing B.4.2.1.
Fail. Evaluated as: Level AA. Wagtail’s documentation for content authors does not demonstrate accessible authoring practices. The documentation for developers does: Accessibility considerations.
Proposed actions:
(Level A). See Implementing B.4.2.2.
Pass. Wagtail’s accessibility checker, heading levels, and alt text implementation are documented in the guide for content authors. The documentation for developers also cover this.
Proposed actions:
(Level AAA). See Implementing B.4.2.3.
Fail. Wagtail’s accessibility features doesn’t have a tutorial.
Proposed actions:
(Level AAA). See Implementing B.4.2.4.
Fail. Wagtail’s documentation for content author does not have such an index. The documentation for developers does.
Proposed actions: