“The web” isn’t one experience — it’s a different experience for every disability category and assistive technology that engages with it. This guide covers accessibility from the user’s perspective: how blind, low-vision, deaf, motor-impaired, and cognitively-disabled users navigate, what assistive tech they rely on, and the design practices that make sites work for everyone.

POUR — Perceivable, Operable, Understandable, Robust — is the conceptual core of web accessibility. Build for all four under WCAG 2.2 AA and you’ll meet nearly every major accessibility law worldwide. This guide breaks each principle into practical implementations with the new 2.2 success criteria.

WCAG is the international standard for web accessibility — published by the W3C and referenced by virtually every major accessibility law worldwide. This 2026 guide covers the version history (1.0 → 2.0 → 2.1 → 2.2, with 3.0 in development), the POUR principles, conformance levels, and how it all fits together for compliance.