Accessibility and the law: what the ADA and Section 508 mean for your site
A plain-language look at the rules that increasingly apply to websites — and the standard they all quietly point to.
Web accessibility is increasingly a legal expectation, not just a nice-to-have. The details vary by region, but the practical picture is simpler than it first appears — and it nearly always comes back to one technical standard.
This is general information, not legal advice. For your specific obligations, talk to a qualified lawyer.
The rules you’ll hear about
- The ADA (US): courts have repeatedly treated business websites as covered, driving a steady stream of accessibility lawsuits and demand letters.
- Section 508 (US): applies to federal agencies and the vendors who sell to them.
- EN 301 549 (EU) and the European Accessibility Act: expanding requirements for many products and services.
They all point to WCAG
Here’s the useful part: almost every one of these references the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) as the measuring stick — currently version 2.2, usually at Level AA. Meet WCAG 2.2 AA and you’ve addressed the substance behind most of these obligations at once.
What to do about it
You don’t need to panic, and you don’t need to memorize statutes. You need to know where your site actually stands against WCAG, fix the barriers in priority order, and keep documentation of the work. That’s exactly what an audit and an honest VPAT give you — turning a vague legal worry into a concrete, finishable to-do list.