Checklist for the accessibility of learning material and digital content
This site provides you with a comprehensive checklist to help you ensure that your learning materials are accessible to all students.
Content updated on 29 January 2026. The language version in Swedish will be updated during January–February 2026.
With the checklists below, you can assess the accessibility of your different types of learning materials and find ways to improve their accessibility.
Why accessibility matters: Without accessible learning materials, many students are left without essential information and learning opportunities. Accessible learning materials are crucial especially for learners with disabilities, impairments or learning difficulties, but they improve the learning experience for everyone.
Who the checklist is for: The checklists are designed especially as support material for teaching staff in higher education, but they can be used by anyone who creates digital content
Summary of key accessibility principles
- Use accessible templates and tools: Use the document templates provided by your institution and check the accessibility of your learning materials with the software’s built-in accessibility tools.
- Ensure clarity and structure: Use heading styles, subheadings, table structures and lists. Write clearly and concisely.
- Ensure visual readability: Use sufficient colour contrast, clear fonts, and avoid using colour as the only way of conveying information.
- Provide alternative ways of presenting information: Add alternative text to images. Add captions or text transcripts in the original language to videos and audio files.
- Remember accessibility also in specialised content: Mathematical formulas, VR and 360° content and LaTeX files require special attention, and finding accessible solutions for them can be challenging.
Checklists for different types of learning materials
| Start with these questions | Do this |
|---|---|
| Is it possible for you to use your higher education institution’s document templates? | Whenever possible, use the accessible document templates provided by your institution (such as PowerPoint slide templates or Word document templates). These templates already include fonts, layouts and document structures that support accessibility [1]. |
| Do you use colours to show importance or meaning? | You may, and it is often useful to, use colours to strengthen your message, but you must not use colour as the only way to communicate information. To highlight content, use, in addition to colour, text formatting, textures/patterns, explanatory text or symbols |
| Is the colour contrast high enough? | Choose colours for text, images and videos so that the contrast between them is high enough (the difference in lightness between white and black is the greatest). Sufficient contrast makes it easier to read the content of the learning material. |
| Are the hyperlink texts descriptive? | Give each hyperlink a descriptive text that makes the purpose of the link clear and tells the user where the link will take them. Make sure that the hyperlink text is visually different from the surrounding text. Typically, link text is underlined and shown in blue [2]. A good link text is the name of the web page or file that the link points to. If the link is an anchor link, that is, it leads to a specific section on a web page, use the heading of that section as the link text. If the hyperlink opens, for example, a Word or PDF file, say this in the link text, for example: “Final report of the Year of the Hare project (PDF)”. |
| Is your file accessible? | Check the accessibility of the file with the built‑in accessibility tools of the software you use (such as Word’s Accessibility Checker). Note, however, that no automated check can find everything, but it is a good starting point. When you share your learning materials, use web pages whenever possible (for example, the Page or Book activity in Moodle), because web content is usually the easiest to make accessible. If you use separate documents, such as PDF, Word or PowerPoint slide sets, remember that PDFs are the most difficult to make accessible. To publish an accessible PDF, you first need to make the original source document accessible. If your learners prefer a certain file format, for example LaTeX or proprietary formats of professional software, make these file formats available as well. |
Further information and references:
[1] Aalto University’s document templates for personnel (Word, PowerPoint) | Aalto University
| Review text-based learning materials with these questions | Do this |
|---|---|
| Do you use heading styles? | Always use the built‑in styles for headings and text sections, such as Heading 1 (H1), Heading 2 (H2), Heading 3 (H3), and so on. In PowerPoint and Google Slides, use the title fields in the slide layouts instead of manual heading styles. The software recognises the text in these fields as slide titles (headings) automatically [1]. Give every PowerPoint and Slides slide a descriptive title. If you cover the same topic on several slides and want to use the same title, you can distinguish the slides by adding, for example, a number or a series marker such as 1/n, 2/n … n/n. For PowerPoint slides, use the accessibility checkers to verify the slide titles and the reading order of the content. |
| Is the colour contrast between text and background high enough? | Choose colours for text and background so that there is a strong contrast between them. The text must clearly stand out from the background and be easy to read. Black text on a white background gives the highest contrast. The reverse – white or very light text on a black or dark background – also works well. Use tools such as the WebAIM Contrast Checker to test your colour choices [2]. |
| Do you use colour in the text to show importance or meaning? | Use bold text, rather than colour alone, to highlight important content. You may, and it is often useful to, use colour to strengthen your message, but you must not use colour as the only way to convey information. Example: verbs in the text are shown in green and nouns in blue. This is allowed, but the information must also be given in a non‑visual way, for example by adding a symbol after each verb and giving the symbol alternative text (alt text). If you want to highlight a specific part of your text, a good method is to add a heading to that section and bring the main point into the heading. |
| Does the text formatting support readability? |
Prefer the accessible templates provided by your higher education institution and read the related guidance. By using these templates and following the instructions, you can most easily apply accessible formatting to your documents and presentations.
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| Is the text easy to read? | Write clear, neutral and easy‑to‑understand text. Avoid long sentences, and split sentences that contain several subordinate clauses into shorter ones. Explain abbreviations. When you repeat a long term, prefer a shorter form, for example instead of repeating “accessibility specialist network Teams meeting”, you can write “the network’s online meeting”. Use subheadings. Descriptive headings make the text easier to skim and read. Whenever you start a new topic or perspective, add a subheading to that section. Use lists to support skimming. Whenever possible, use multiple formats such as images, figures and videos. Choose the font size according to how the material will be used. When the text is part of a slide presentation, use your institution’s slide templates and their automatic formatting. If you want to publish the content in another easy‑to‑read format, use tools that allow the user to change the text size dynamically (for example a Word document or an HTML web page). |
Further information and references:
[1] Headings | Web Accessibility Initiative (WAI) | W3C
[3] Accessible web content: Easy readability for better understanding
| Review images and drawings with these questions | Do this |
|---|---|
| Do the images have an alternative description? | Every image must have an alternative description. This is also called alt text (sometimes text alternative or image description). The alt text in the image properties can be empty if the image does not add information to the material. In that case, the image is decorative. You can also mark an image as decorative if the same information is already given in the main body text or on a separate page/appendix. |
| Is the alternative description good? | A good alternative description communicates the essential content of the image. The alt text stored in the image properties should be no longer than one short paragraph, and it cannot contain other content elements such as tables, language changes or lists. If the image needs a longer explanation than one short paragraph, give that explanation in the main text. You can provide it in a separate appendix or on its own web page. In most text editors you can add alt text to an image via the context menu (right‑click → “Alt text” or similar). In some editors, you first choose an “edit image” function and then add the alternative description there. If no alt text is needed, for example in Word, mark the image as decorative. In some programs you must enter a space (or, if that is not accepted, a full stop) in the description field. If a more detailed description of the image is in a separate appendix, add a reference or link to it in the image caption. |
| Do you use an image as a link? | If an image acts as a link, explain in the alternative text (alt text) where the link goes. See the instructions on hyperlink formatting in the “0. Start here” checklist. |
| Does the image contain text? | Text should generally not be presented inside images (logos are an exception). Charts, models and diagrams, however, do contain text. In these cases it is especially important to ensure that the text stands out clearly from the background and has sufficient contrast. |
| Is the image sharp enough, and do the essential elements stand out from the background? | The image resolution should be high enough that the essential content is easy to see. Also check the contrast in the image: do the most important elements clearly stand out from the background and from each other? |
| Is the image cropped to what is essential? | Crop the image so that it only shows what is relevant. |
| Has the image format been chosen according to the characteristics of the image? | If your publishing platform/file type supports vector images (SVG), use SVG for line drawings whenever an SVG version is available or can be created. Vector images scale cleanly and can be enlarged without loss of quality. Line drawings also include graphs and charts. Line drawings usually use fewer colours than so‑called continuous‑tone images and often have flat colour areas. If SVG is not possible, choose PNG for line drawings. PNG is pixel‑based, not vector‑based, so the quality will decrease if you enlarge the image. For photographs and other continuous‑tone images, the best format on the web is JPG. JPG is a lossy format, so avoid saving the same image repeatedly, as the quality decreases with each save [1]. |
| If your image is a raster image (JPG, PNG or GIF), is the image size appropriate? | Optimise the image size for its purpose. The image should appear in your material at 100% size, so you do not need to scale it down further in the document. If you only resize it visually by scaling, the file size will not decrease at the same time. When you create material to be viewed on screen and not printed, raster images (JPG, PNG, GIF) should typically have a resolution of 72 ppi (pixels per inch). |
Further information and references:
[1] Accessible web content: Easy readability for better understanding
| Review charts and infographics with these questions | Do this |
|---|---|
| Is the colour contrast in charts and infographics high enough? | Choose colours for text and background so that there is sufficient contrast between them, for example black text on a white background. A useful, free online tool for checking colour contrast is the Contrast Checker [1]. A good way to make sure that understanding the information does not depend on colour is to look at the image in greyscale. If the essential elements are still clearly visible in shades of grey, comprehension should not depend on seeing colours. If needed, place the text in a solid‑colour box when the background is busy or contrast is otherwise too low. In graphs, consider using outlines for segments and bars if this helps to distinguish them from each other. |
| Do you use colour to convey information? | In charts such as bar charts, use, in addition to colour, text labels, different shapes or line styles. |
| Does the chart/infographic contain text? | Choose fonts, font sizes and formatting so that they support on‑screen reading. Use bold sparingly. Do not use italics. Ensure sufficient contrast between the text and its background. |
| Does the text formatting support readability? | In an infographic, it is important that there is as little text as possible, that the text is large enough, and that explanatory text is placed close to the item it refers to. Read more about accessible text formatting in the 1. Texts checklist. |
| Do the charts/infographics have alternative text? | Add clear alternative text descriptions (alt texts) to the images. Alt text should be short, so it is recommended to present the chart data and a more detailed explanation in separate body text. For example, in a PowerPoint presentation, you can put this on the next slide, or in an appendix to the document, and then refer to it in the alt text or place the explanation next to the chart/infographic. Read more about alternative texts in the 2. Images and drawings checklist. |
Further information and references:
| Review the tables in your learning materials with these questions | Do this |
|---|---|
| Is a table the best way to present this information? | Use a table for information that is naturally presented in tabular form. Do not use tables just for layout (for example, to create columns). |
| Is your table also technically a table? | The table must be created as a real table, not, for example, as an image of a table. |
| Does your table have a header row (or header column)? | Define a header row (and/or header column) for the contents of the table. The headers must be marked as headers technically; visual formatting such as bold text alone is not enough. |
| Is your table simple enough? | If you feel you need merged cells in your table, this is usually a good sign that the table should be split into two or more separate tables. |
| Does every cell contain content? | Every cell in the table must contain something. If data is not available, the cell should contain, for example, 0, “not available”, “NA”, “n/a”, “no data”, or another clear indicator that the lack of data is intentional. Note that a hyphen or em dash is usually not read aloud by screen readers unless this is specifically enabled in the settings. Therefore they are not good indicators of an empty cell on their own, unless you explicitly explain that you use them in this way. A screen reader user can then choose to enable reading of special characters if needed. |
| Does the table have a title/description? | Describe the purpose of the table in its title (a caption in HTML) or in an alternative description (alt text in Word). |
| Does the text formatting support readability? | If a cell contains a lot of text, left‑align it. Headers can be centred, and numbers that are easier to compare when right‑aligned should be right‑aligned. Choose fonts, font sizes and formatting so that they support on‑screen reading. |
| Does your table contain images? | Make sure that all images have clear alternative text descriptions (alt texts). Images must have sufficient contrast and must not rely on colour alone to convey information. For example, circles that differ only by colour are not sufficient unless there is another distinguishing feature, such as size, fill pattern or outline. You can also use different shapes from the start, such as a circle, square and triangle. |
| Can a screen reader user find your table? | For Excel files and similar spreadsheet programs: start the table in cell A1 on the sheet, or at least use cell A1 to tell where the table begins. Put only one table on each sheet. Give each sheet a descriptive name. |
| Review video and audio with these questions | Do this |
|---|---|
| Does the video verbally describe everything that is shown (for example PowerPoint slides)? | If the video contains visual elements such as PowerPoint slides in addition to a talking head, describe in speech all essential information that a sighted viewer can see. |
| Are the audio track and the subtitles in the same language? | In an accessible video, the audio track and the subtitles are in the same language. Note that translated subtitles alone do not make the video accessible in the target language [1] [2]. Example: if a video is in Finnish and has subtitles in Finnish and English, it is only accessible in Finnish. An English‑language version of the video must be created separately, or you must provide an English text alternative (full transcript) in addition to the subtitles, because a text alternative can be listened to with a screen reader, unlike subtitles. |
| Is a text alternative available for the audio/video? | Every audio recording (for example a podcast) must have a text alternative (a written transcript). You can also provide a text alternative for a video, if the audio track alone is not accessible [1] [2]. A text alternative is a written version of the audio or video content. If the video has only image and no sound, you must provide either a text alternative or an audio description track that explains what happens in the video. A video can also be a media alternative to text. In that case you do not need to add subtitles, but you must clearly label it as a media alternative and place it next to the corresponding text. The text or media alternative must contain the same information as the original audio, video or text. One must not contain more information than the other. If the video shows a PowerPoint presentation with text, but the speaker also says additional things, the slide deck cannot be used as the text alternative for the video. |
| Does the video have subtitles? | The video must have subtitles that match its audio track. Subtitles must also include other essential sounds than speech, for example: [alarm clock rings]. If the speaker changes and this is not visible in the video, indicate this in the subtitles, for example: “Matt: ” If the publishing platform supports separate subtitle files, use them. These are called closed captions (CC). The user can turn them on or off. If the platform supports closed captions that users can control, choose this option. If you publish the video in an environment where the player does not support subtitles, you must “burn” the subtitles into the video image. Then the subtitles cannot be edited or turned off. These are called open captions. |
| Is there space at the bottom of the video for subtitles? | If you show, for example, a full‑screen PowerPoint presentation in your video, leave the bottom part of the slides empty so that subtitles do not cover important content. Also take into account possible platform‑specific differences (some players place subtitles higher or lower on the screen). |
| Does the video contain other visual elements, such as the speaker’s name, opening credits or end credits? | If the video shows information visually, such as the speaker’s name or opening credits, this information must also be spoken on the audio track. The video can also have a separate audio description track, if the video player supports this. If the player does not support a separate track, you can create a second version of the video where both the original audio and the audio description are on the same track. Publish this as a separate video and provide a link to it next to the main video. |
| Do the visual materials used in the video (for example PowerPoint slides) need to be accessible? | All presentation materials shown in the video, such as PowerPoint slides, must be visually accessible. Read more about formatting and colour contrast in the checklists “Texts”, “Images” and “Charts and infographics”. |
| Could your video trigger a seizure or other health reaction? | The video should not contain content that flashes more than 3 times per second without a clear warning. Such flashing may cause, for example, a migraine or an epileptic seizure for some people. If you need to show a phenomenon that flashes rapidly, create a separate video for it and clearly warn the viewer both next to the video and in the video itself that it contains flashing which may trigger a seizure. |
Further information and references:
[1] Making Audio and Video Media Accessible | Web Accessibility Initiative (WAI) | W3C
| Review VR and 360° learning material with these questions | Do this |
|---|---|
| Is there an accessible alternative learning material available for the VR/360 content? | Making multi‑sensory learning materials fully accessible is challenging. VR/360 environments are often not fully accessible for all users, so you may need to provide alternative learning materials. There are many accessible alternatives, but you should choose the option that best supports the learner and allows them to engage with the topic in enough depth. An accessible alternative could be, for example, a written description of what the learner would experience in the VR environment, a teaching video or audio guide that explains the virtual environment, or a series of still images. It is important to check in advance whether the chosen alternative suits the learner’s needs [1]. |
| Have accessibility criteria for text, colours and images been taken into account when designing the content? | Review the earlier checklists on texts, images, and charts/infographics and apply the same principles in the VR/360 environment. |
| Is the user guided on how to navigate in the environment and how to proceed through the different stages? | Adequate guidance is essential in multi‑sensory learning environments. The instructions must explain how to move around in the environment and what the learner is expected to do to progress in the learning task. It is recommended to use progress tracking so that the learner can see where they are in the overall learning process. You can add short instructional texts at the beginning and end of activities to describe the phases of the task. |
| Can the user customise the environment to suit their needs? | Allow the user to adjust, for example, the sound level, movement speed, remove certain visual effects, or change the view according to their needs. |
| In a screen‑based virtual environment, is it possible to navigate using keyboard commands? | Keyboard navigation is a key accessibility requirement. However, many of the VR/360 learning environments commonly used in higher education (such as 3DVista, ThingLink) currently do not support navigation using the keyboard. |
| Are there alternatives to the controllers used with VR headsets? | Be aware that different types of disabilities can affect the ability to use handheld controllers. Depending on the learner’s needs, alternative control methods can include, for example, voice commands, eye tracking or hand gestures/hand tracking. |
Further information and references:
| Review course books and articles with these questions | Do this |
|---|---|
| Is the course book available in an accessible digital format? | Check your higher education institution’s library pages to see whether the book is available as an e‑book or audio book. Not all e‑books are automatically accessible, so you can ask the library for more information about the level of accessibility. You can also send the library a purchase request for an accessible version. If an accessible book is not available, the learner can send a request to Celia Library to produce an accessible version of the book. The production time is about three months [1]. |
| Is there an accessible electronic version of the article? | Check your institution’s library pages to see whether the article is available as an e‑article. You can also send a purchase request for an e‑article. If you share an article as a PDF file, check that it is accessible by using Adobe Acrobat Pro [2] or PDF Xchange Editor [3] [4]. |
Lisätiedot ja lähteet:
[1] Accessible coursebooks | Aalto University
To be complemented later with chemical symbols.
| Review mathematical notation with these questions | Do this |
|---|---|
| Do you create formulas in Microsoft Word? | Use the Equation Editor tool to create formulas. Use Unicode characters so that screen readers can recognise them correctly. Also add alternative text to formulas to ensure compatibility with different screen readers. |
| Do you create formulas in Microsoft PowerPoint? | Use the Equation Editor tool to create formulas. Also add alternative text to formulas to ensure compatibility with different screen readers. |
| Do you publish mathematical notation on web pages? | On the web, mathematics should ideally be presented as MathML code, with TeX code offered as a text alternative and an SVG image as a visual alternative presentation [1]. |
Further information and references:
| Review content in LaTeX files with these questions | Do this |
|---|---|
| Have you provided alternative text for images? | The Graphicx package allows you to add alternative text (alt text) to images. However, a known problem is that alt texts are not always preserved when converting to PDF. For this reason, it is recommended to give a more detailed description of the image in the main body text or in a separate appendix. You can also state in the document that, due to technical limitations, the images do not contain alt text and that their content is described in the main text. |
| Does the file contain drawings/line art images? | Describe the content of drawings separately in the main text. At the moment, LaTeX drawing tools do not support adding alt text. |
| Does the file contain mathematical notation? | Use the axessibility package, which converts formulas into commands that screen readers can read. |
About the checklist |
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Version 2 / 29 January 2026: This site was updated on 29 January 2026 by adding new content and clarifying the formatting. The Swedish version will be published during January–February 2026. Responsibility for updates and authors: The site is maintained and the content is produced by Suvi Toivonen, suvi.toivonen@aalto.fi (Aalto University), Anna-Liisa Mattila (University of Oulu), Satu Turkka (University of Eastern Finland) and Jenni Torikka (Metropolia University of Applied Sciences). Further use and licence: The checklist may be adapted for the needs of your own higher education institution under the following licence: CC BY‑NC‑SA 4.0 (More information about this licence). Suggested citation: Mattila, A.-L., Turkka, S., Toivonen, S. & Torikka, J. (2025). Checklist for the accessibility of learning materials and digital content (Version 2). Retrieved [date]. Aalto University. Feedback and service requests for Aalto University staff: myteachingsupport@aalto.fi Thanks for support and collaboration: Silvana Perez Läherinta, Samuel Girmay, Antti Huittinen & Luis Costa / Aalto University. |