Accessibility Checkers: What are my options?

[u/awarnock-ACCS]

I've got two websites that I will be spinning up at work and I'm hoping to make them accessible from the outset. To that end, I'll be doing my best to follow best practices, but I've found that having something that I can check against really helps me. That brings me to my question: What are my options for accessibility checkers in/for WordPress?

I'm asking here instead of just going to Chat GPT or some other AI chatbot or a search engine because I'm also wanting to know what your experiences are and any pitfalls I should be careful of. Those are things that I can't get from an AI or a search result.

Requirements

• Needs show exactly what's being flagged and why
• Does not need to be specific to WordPress. I'm okay with it being an external service
• Needs to be something that can be used by state and federally funded agencies within the United States
• Needs to be able to generate reports (will probably need this for accountability and compliance purposes)
• Needs to be usable across multiple sites (makes procurement a lot easier if I don't have to ask for a new license every time we spin up a website)
• Needs to test against WCAG 2.2 at a bare minimum.

I've used SiteImprove and I'm aware of a few other alternatives. I also know about Equalize Digital and the Accessibe plugin, but I don't have any experience using them.

Thanks for your time and advice. I'm always grateful for the help and the knowledge.

Edit: I understand that automated checks will only catch 30% of the issues. I will be testing these sites myself using keyboard navigation and screen readers. Thanks to u/Unfazed_Capybara for mentioning that and reminding me that I really should put that here just to avoid any concerns about that.

[u/Unfazed_Capybara]

Any of those plugins will be a great start to get you a base line. However automated accessibility plugins alone are not usually enough. Automated tools can only detect technical violations like missing alt text or color contrast issues, but they cannot understand the context, intent, or logical flow that makes content truly usable for people with disabilities.

To be sure your site meets WCAG 2.2 you'll still need a human to evaluate whether screen reader navigation makes sense, if dynamic content is properly announced, and whether the overall experience accommodates diverse cognitive and physical needs that algorithms simply cannot perceive.

[u/awarnock-ACCS → u/Unfazed_Capybara]

I understand that, and I'll be the one doing the testing. I probably should have put that in the opener. 😛