Mobile
Describe your images for people who cannot see them
Some of your images have no text description attached, so they are invisible to screen readers and to search engines.
Why does it matter?
Alt text is read aloud by screen readers, so without it a blind visitor hears nothing where your image is. It is also what search engines read to understand an image, which is how images get found in image search. And if an image fails to load, alt text is what shows in its place.
How would you notice it?
- A visitor using a screen reader cannot tell what your photos show.
- Your images do not appear in Google image search.
- Broken images leave an unexplained empty gap.
How do you fix it?
Stage 1
- Work through your images one at a time. For each one, ask whether it carries meaning or is purely decorative.
- For a meaningful image, add an alt attribute describing what it shows in a short sentence.
Describe the content, not the file. "Team van photo" helps nobody.
<img src="team-van.jpg" alt="Two plumbers unloading tools from a branded van">Stage 2
- For a decorative image, add an alt attribute with an empty value so screen readers skip it.
Leaving alt out entirely is not the same. Screen readers then read the file name aloud.
<img src="divider-swirl.png" alt="">Stage 3
- Keep each description under about 125 characters. Longer text is usually read as a tedious paragraph.
How do you check it worked?
Confirm it worked
Re-run the Siege Test. The Missing alt text check should reach zero. Then hover over an image in your browser and confirm the description appears as a tooltip.