With just weeks left until the European Accessibility Act (EAA) deadline takes hold, many companies are racing to appear ready. Beneath the surface, most are still flying blind when it comes to delivering truly inclusive digital experiences.
That’s the central finding from Applause’s fifth annual State of Digital Quality in Accessibility survey, which draws on insights from more than 1,500 developers, QA testers, UX pros, and legal professionals. While awareness of digital accessibility has hit an all-time high, execution remains a weak spot.
The good news is that 80% of respondents say their company has at least one person or group responsible for accessibility, up sharply from 52% in 2022. Fortunately, 86% now say inclusive design principles are being baked in from the planning stage.
The follow-through is not so impressive, though. Nearly 70% say their teams still lack the expertise and resources to test digital experiences for accessibility independently and continuously. In other words, the accessibility job often starts strong but stalls before launch.
Nearly 50% of organisations either don’t have (or don’t know if they have) formal processes in place to stop inaccessible features from reaching production. The most common user complaints remain painfully basic, like no captions on videos, websites that won’t play nice with screen readers, and vague or unhelpful error alerts.
AI’s promise and its blind spots
AI is quickly becoming part of the accessibility conversation, though not always for the right reasons. About half of the companies surveyed already use AI-powered tools for accessibility testing, and many more expect to follow within two years.
However, the same old bias problems are showing up in new ways. Half of the teams building AI or GenAI products admit they aren’t including underrepresented user groups, including people with disabilities, in their testing. AI trained on narrow feedback loops can quietly reintroduce the very barriers accessibility efforts aim to dismantle.
European Accessibility Act is kicking in fast
Ninety-four percent of organisations say they’re preparing for the June 28, 2025, EAA deadline, up from just 58% last year. More are meeting WCAG 2.2 standards, too, as 54% say they’re already compliant, up from 30% in 2022.
Interestingly, it’s not legal pressure driving accessibility efforts, but a desire to improve usability for its own sake.
For the fourth year in a row, the top reason companies cited for investing in accessibility was “improving usability for all users”, beating out fear of lawsuits, SEO benefits, and even marketshare concerns.
Most development teams are tackling this issue earlier in the software development lifecycle — 77% say they’re building it in from the start. Without sufficient testing or user engagement, that early work risks being undone by late-stage oversights.
Accessibility is now a regulatory requirement, a CX differentiator, and a test of whether your digital infrastructure is ready for the future.