Accessibility

People use Apple's accessibility features, such as reduced transparency, VoiceOver, and increased text size, to personalize how they interact with their devices in ways that work for them. An accessible app supports such personalizations by design and gives everyone a great user experience, regardless of their capabilities or how they use their devices.

Impairments and Accommodations

Approximately one in seven people worldwide have a disability or impairment that affects the way they interact with the world and their devices. People can experience impairments at any age, for any duration, and at varying levels of severity. Situational impairments—temporary conditions such as driving a car, hiking on a bright day, or studying in a quiet library—can affect the way almost everyone interacts with their devices at various times.

Begin designing your app to be inclusive and accessible to everyone by reviewing the four main categories of impairments and the accessibility features that address them.

Vision

Vision impairments include blindness, color blindness, all forms of vision loss, and challenges and situations that make seeing the screen uncomfortable or difficult.

For users with vision impairments, Apple provides VoiceOver on every platform and supports display accommodations such as color inversion, larger text, zoom, and magnifier.

Hearing

In addition to all types of hearing loss, hearing impairments include situations in which people don't want their devices to make noise, such as when they're in a theater.

Apple provides alternatives to aural interaction with features such as closed captioning, visual and haptic notifications, and Type to Siri mode.

Physical and Motor

People with physical and motor challenges can have difficulty holding or manipulating their devices.

Apple provides several accommodations to help people use their devices without the need for fine motor control:

Switch Control integrates adaptive devices with iPhone, iPad, Mac, and Apple TV

Siri helps people control apps and devices using their voices

Assistive Touch makes standard gestures easier to perform

Literacy and Learning

Literacy and learning challenges include difficulty speaking and reading, managing complexity, and staying focused.

To reduce cognitive load and support people with literacy and learning challenges, Apple provides features such as Speak Screen, Typing Feedback, and Safari Reader.