Documents

Create accessible electronic documents, no matter what format

When creating electronic documents, you should strive to make the documents accessible to and inclusive of the widest-possible audience. The basic guidelines included in this section help provide a base level of accessibility when creating most types of electronic documents, including Microsoft Office, PDF, and other document formats.

Accessible documents are:

• Scannable: Readers can quickly scan a document to find out what it contains.
• Searchable: Readers can use a digital device to search for words in the document.
• Legible: Sighted readers can physically read the text. 
• Readable: Readers can easily understand the messages in the document. 

General guidelines for accessible documents

Each of these guidelines is crucial to create a document with a base level of accessibility:

• Provide a descriptive title
• Use appropriate language for the audience
• Arrange a clear document structure
• Provide alternative text for visual content
• Write descriptive labels for links
• Apply color sparingly

These core guidelines for accessibility should be applied to all documents, regardless of the authoring tool or software. However, individual applications of these guidelines to each document may vary based on the authoring tool used.