Email accessibility checker: alt text, contrast and screen readers
In short: Checks a pasted HTML email against the WCAG basics that apply to email: a lang attribute, layout tables marked role="presentation", alt text that isn't a file name, links that say where they go, heading order, text under 14px and inline colour contrast below 4.5:1. Limit: It reads the code; it can't judge whether alt text or link text actually makes sense.
Paste your HTML email and this checker reports what makes it hard to read with a screen reader or low vision: no lang attribute, layout tables without role="presentation", images with no or file-name alt text, empty or "click here" links, skipped headings, text under 14px and text colours below WCAG's 4.5:1 contrast.
Price: this tool is free. Checking a whole email list is from $9/mo, and the first 100 checks are free with Google, no card. See pricing
Sample result
5 to fix: no lang, a layout table without role="presentation", missing alt, an unlabelled link and 2.11:1 contrast.
- Accessibility
- 5 to fix
- To check
- 3
- Images
- 2
What this means for you
Screen readers get the language, skip the layout and hear what each image and link says.
- lang and role="presentation"
- Alt text and link text
- Text under 14px
- Contrast against the background
- Accessibility
- WCAG
- Alt text
By SimpleVerifier Team · Last updated · Runs in your browser; nothing you paste is sent to us
How do I check the list the email goes to?
- Fix the accessibility items here.
- Upload your send list at /verify. Every address gets a live mailbox check, and valid, risky and invalid download as separate files. The first 100 email checks are free with a Google sign-in, no card.
- Send only to the valid file.
How do I check an email for accessibility?
- Copy the HTML from your email builder's code view, or export the .html file.
- Paste it here or upload the file, and press Check accessibility.
- Fix the items marked to fix: the language, layout tables, missing alt text, empty links and low contrast.
- Then read the email with a screen reader (VoiceOver on a Mac or iPhone, NVDA on Windows) once.
Example
- You enter
- An HTML email with no lang attribute, a layout table without role="presentation", a linked logo with no alt, a hero image with alt
spring-hero.jpg, a "click here" link, and an 11px #aaaaaa footer on a #f4f4f4 cell. - You get
- 5 to fix (no lang, the layout table, the image with no alt, the logo link with no readable text, and the footer colour at 2.11:1, below 4.5:1) and 3 to check (the file-name alt text, the "click here" link and text under 14px).
- Limits
- Runs in your browser, so the HTML is not uploaded and no image is loaded; an uploaded file can be up to 25 MB.
What makes an email accessible?
The same things that make a web page accessible, applied to a format built from tables. A screen reader needs to know the language (lang="en" on the <html> tag, per WCAG 3.1.1), needs alt text on every image that carries meaning (1.1.1), and needs link text that says where each link goes (2.4.4). Readers with low vision need text with enough contrast: 4.5:1 for normal text and 3:1 for large text under WCAG 1.4.3.
Email adds one rule of its own: layout tables. A screen reader announces every table's size before reading it, so a template with five nested layout tables starts with five announcements of rows and columns. Adding role="presentation" to each layout table, which the WAI-ARIA spec defines for exactly this, makes it read the content only.
How do I write alt text for email images?
Say what the image says, not what it is. A banner reading "20% off all spring jackets" needs that text as its alt, not "banner" or spring-hero.jpg. A logo that links to your site needs alt text that names the destination, such as "Northwind home page", because for a screen reader the alt is the link's only text. Spacers, dividers and decoration get an empty alt="" so they are skipped.
Alt text matters even for sighted readers: many inboxes block images until the reader allows them, and then the alt text is what shows. If an image carries a paragraph of copy, put that copy in live text instead.
How is contrast checked?
For every element with a text colour set in its style attribute, the checker finds the nearest background colour set on it or a parent (style or bgcolor) and computes the WCAG contrast ratio. Where no background is set, it assumes white and says so. Colours set in a <style> block, and changes made by dark mode, aren't checked.
Who uses this tool, and for what?
- Email marketers
- Catch file-name alt text and "click here" links before the campaign goes to everyone, screen reader users included.
- Email developers
- Make sure every layout table in a new template has
role="presentation"and the html tag has a lang. - Public sector and education
- Check bulletins against the WCAG basics your accessibility policy already applies to the website.
- Agencies
- Hand a client a list of contrast and alt-text fixes with the WCAG criterion beside each one.
What can’t this tool tell you?
- It reads the code; it can't judge whether alt text or link text actually makes sense.
- Contrast is checked only for colours set inline, not in a
<style>block or dark mode. - It is not an accessibility audit and can't certify WCAG conformance.
- It can't tell whether the addresses you send to exist.
Common questions
- What contrast ratio does email text need?
- WCAG 2.2 level AA asks for at least 4.5:1 between normal text and its background, and 3:1 for large text (about 24px, or 19px bold). Light grey footer text on white often fails.
- Do layout tables need role="presentation"?
- Yes. Without it, screen readers announce each table's rows and columns before the content. Leave it off real data tables that use <th> headers.
- Is there a minimum font size for email?
- WCAG sets none, but small text is hard to read on phones. Most email accessibility guides recommend at least 14px for body copy, and 16px is better.
- Does this make my email WCAG compliant?
- No checker can. It covers the checks that can be read from the code; a person still has to judge whether the alt text and link text make sense, and read the email with a screen reader.
Sources
A tidy list can still be full of dead addresses.
Extracting, deduplicating and syntax checks all work on the text of an address. None of them can tell whether the mailbox exists. Only the server that hosts it can answer that, through an SMTP check, and that is what the paid product does.
- Upload the cleaned file as it is: CSVs up to 100,000 rows
- A real SMTP mailbox check on every row, with catch-all detection
- Small list? Starter at $9/mo covers 2,500 emails a month, cancel anytime
Plans from $9 a month, cancel anytime, no contract. Sign in with Google and your first 100 email checks are free, no card. The free tools stay free either way.