Accessible email: messages everyone can read

Some of your members read email in ways you may never have seen. One listens to it through a screen reader, software that reads the screen aloud. Another zooms in so far that only a few words fit across the display. Another is color blind, has dyslexia, reads English as a second language or has a tremor that makes small links hard to tap. Many more have a temporary version of the same problem: a broken wrist, a cracked phone screen, glasses left at home.

An email that ignores these readers does not just inconvenience them. It can make your membership impossible to use, because email is how members find new content, join events and manage their accounts. The encouraging part is that accessible email is mostly good email: clear structure, meaningful links, readable text and plain words. The changes that help members with disabilities make every email easier for everyone.

How people with different needs read your email

Knowing how assistive tools work explains most of the advice that follows:

• Screen readers read the email from top to bottom, in the order it was built. They announce headings and lists, read the alt text of images and can jump from heading to heading or list every link on its own.
• Magnification enlarges part of the screen, so the reader sees a small window of the email at a time and has to scroll sideways if the layout is wide.
• High-contrast and dark settings change your colors, sometimes in ways that hide text placed on images.
• Voice control lets people say the words on a link or button to activate it, which only works if those words are visible and sensible.

Give the message a structure that can be navigated

Structure is what lets a screen reader user skim, just as a sighted reader skims by eye. In a longer email, such as a digest, use real headings for each section rather than text that is simply made bold or large; your email tool's heading styles do this for you. Make lists with the list button, not with dashes typed by hand, so they are announced as lists.

Keep the layout to a single column, so the reading order is the same for everyone and nothing jumps around when zoomed. Left-align your text. Centered paragraphs and justified text, where the spacing between words is stretched, are harder to follow for many readers, including many with dyslexia. A single column is also exactly what works on a phone, as covered in emails that work on a phone.

Describe images properly

Every image needs alt text, the short description that screen readers read aloud and that appears when images do not load. Write it to match what the image is doing:

• Informative images need a description of the information. Not “photo,” but “The old corn exchange building in the early days of the town, with horse-drawn carts outside.”
• Decorative images, such as a divider line or a background flourish, should have empty alt text so screen readers skip them instead of announcing a file name.
• Images containing text should be avoided. If you must use one, repeat the text in the email itself, not only in the alt text.

Never put dates, times, prices or instructions only in an image. Those are the details members most need, and the first to disappear.

Write links that make sense on their own

Screen reader users often pull up a list of every link in an email. If five of them say “click here,” the list is useless. Link text should describe where it goes:

• Before: “To see the talk details, click here.” After: “See the details of the harbor history talk.”
• Before: “Download” After: “Download the walking tour map”
• Before: a bare web address After: the name of the page it opens

Keep links underlined, or otherwise clearly distinguished from ordinary text by more than color, and leave space between them so they are easy to tap.

Color, contrast, type and wording

Low-contrast text, such as pale gray on white, is hard for many people to read and almost impossible in bright light. Aim for dark text on a light background, or the reverse, with a strong difference between them. Color and contrast for readable pages explains how to check contrast, and the same principles apply in email.

Never rely on color alone to carry meaning. “Sessions in green still have space” means nothing to a member who cannot distinguish green. Add a word: “Space available.” Use a comfortable text size, avoid long passages in capitals, which are harder to read and are sometimes read letter by letter, and avoid thin, decorative fonts for body text.

Wording matters as much as appearance. Short sentences, familiar words and one idea per paragraph make email easier to understand for members with cognitive disabilities, members reading in a second language and busy members skimming on a phone. Spell out abbreviations the first time. Be careful with emoji: screen readers read out their names, so a row of them in a subject line becomes a string of descriptions before the actual words. Use them sparingly, never in place of words, and not at the start of a subject line.

Worked example: a talk invitation, revised

Imagine a hypothetical local history society run by Bernard, whose members include many older readers. His invitation to a monthly talk was a single image: a poster with the title, date and time in decorative lettering, followed by “Click here to book.” To a screen reader it said only “image, click here to book.”

His revised version has the title, date, time and speaker as real text in a single column, a heading for “How to join,” the poster underneath with alt text describing it, and a button that reads “Book a place at the harbor history talk.” It took ten extra minutes, and it now works for every member.

Your accessible email checklist

• Key information is in real text, never only in images.
• Every informative image has meaningful alt text, and decorative images have empty alt text.
• Longer emails use real headings and real lists.
• The layout is a single column with left-aligned text.
• Every link and button says where it goes.
• Text has strong contrast, and color is never the only signal.
• Sentences are short and abbreviations are explained.
• Emoji are rare and never replace words.
• You have listened to one email with your phone's built-in screen reader.