ADA Compliance: How the Wrong Font Size Can Get You Sued

Web accessibility lawsuits are on the rise, according to the US Chamber of Commerce. Under Title III of the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA), businesses must provide people with disabilities equal access to their goods and services, and that includes their websites. Some well-known brands that have faced ADA lawsuits include WellPoint, HCA Holdings, Tenet Healthcare, and CAC Florida Medical Centers. 

Lawsuits are only a part of the reason for ADA compliance. The core of ADA web accessibility rules is ensuring equal access for everyone on the web. ADA-compliant font sizes are a key part of your accessibility strategy, and partnering with an agency that offers ADA compliance services helps you prepare for the April 24 deadline. 

What is an ADA-Compliant Website?  

An ADA-compliant website enables individuals with vision and cognitive impairments to access your web content. ADA compliance applies to all web content, including multimedia, electronic documents, e-commerce platforms, and web pages. People with disabilities may use assistive devices to access your content, such as joysticks, alternative keyboards, screen readers, and other adaptive input methods. Your website must accommodate assistive device use to remain compliant. 

What Does ADA Compliance Require for Font Size?

The US Department of Justice (DOJ) deems the Web Content Accessibility Guideline (WCAG) 2.1 AA success criteria the gold standard of ADA website compliance. In short, your website should meet all 38 requirements of the success criteria before it’s considered ADA-compliant. For healthcare organizations that receive federal funding, Section 508 of the Rehabilitation Act adds another layer of obligation, and it uses the same WCAG guidelines to set the bar

ADA vs WCAG vs Section 508: How to Evaluate Font Size

To understand how authorities assess fonts, it helps to look at how the ADA, WCAG, and Section 508 work together.

• ADA: The ADA is a civil rights law that requires equitable access for people with disabilities to goods and services. It doesn’t specify the font size parameters or other technical standards. 
• WCAG: WCAG addresses the technical gaps in the ADA. Courts and the DOJ rely on WCAG 2.1 AA as the benchmark for determining whether a website meets ADA requirements. 
• Section 508: Section 508 applies specifically to federal agencies and their contractors, requiring accessible information and communications technology. It uses WCAG 2.0 AA as its standard, and since it mirrors WCAG, meeting WCAG largely satisfies Section 508 as well. 

Keeping to guidelines ensures your website remains compliant. When choosing your website branding, consider how font size might affect ADA compliance. 

Is There a Required ADA-Compliant Font Size?

No rule governs specific font sizes, but some font sizes are easier to zoom in on and navigate for site visitors with low vision. Here are a few things to bear in mind when deciding on your brand’s web-based font sizes: 

• The recommended minimum font size for body text is 16px, roughly equivalent to 12pt, which aligns with both WCAG guidance and Google’s own standards
• Very small text, anything below 12pt, creates readability challenges for users with low vision and increases your compliance risk
• Text needs to scale to 200% without breaking the layout or requiring horizontal scrolling, per WCAG 1.4.4

The goal of ADA compliance is to ensure continuity of accessibility across all websites. Knowing how to bring your website up to that standard will help you meet the ADA compliance deadline. 

How Font Size Helps You Remain ADA Compliant 

Text is a common factor across all websites and is a crucial component of web accessibility. It’s one of the primary components that screen readers read. In the finance and healthcare industries, font size is a key consideration in web design to avoid ADA violations. 

ADA-compliant font sizes are important to people with disabilities, considering that nearly 8.7 million people in the US have vision impairment, and around 1 million have blindness. 

You should also consider how the font types affect your website’s accessibility. Preferred typefaces are sans serif, which means they are simple fonts without the little curls and lifts, such as Tahoma, Calibri, Helvetica, Arial, Verdana. 

The color of your font and the contrast between the writing and the background should be easily discernible and not take away from the readability. Follow the WCAG 2.1 guidelines to ensure you’re meeting the visibility requirements, which is helpful to those with color blindness or low visibility. 

Using Alt Text Descriptions for ADA Compliance 

Images, graphics, and videos are central to most websites, but they create a significant accessibility challenge for users who rely on screen readers. When site visitors use text readers, visuals may pose a challenge because some accessibility tools can’t process images. Alternative text describes the content of an image or video to improve accessibility. Forms of alternative text you should use, according to WCAG 2.1 standards, are: 

• Alt text: A brief description added to an image’s HTML code that screen readers read aloud to describe the image to users who cannot see it
• Long descriptions: Used for complex visuals like graphs, charts, and infographics where a short alt text isn’t sufficient to convey the full content
• Closed captions: A text version of spoken audio and relevant sound in video content, displayed on screen for users who are deaf, hard of hearing, or unable to use audio

One area designers may overlook ADA compliant font sizes is navigation keys, such as the “home” button. By using text or alt text with an image, you improve navigation for people with disabilities. Website elements that should include alt text include navigation buttons, graphs, maps, and schematics. 

The consequences of skipping alt text can be significant. In a landmark case, the National Federation of the Blind sued Target over an inaccessible website, citing missing alt text and the inability to navigate without a mouse. 

The case established the first precedent in the country regarding website accessibility for commercial websites, with the court ruling that commercial websites are required to be accessible under the ADA and state laws.

Using Hyperlink Text in ADA Compliant Fonts for Websites  

Hyperlinks are an indispensable part of your website as they allow site visitors to navigate effortlessly. Your site visitors can move from page to page or from website to website to find relevant information. Normal-sighted visitors can identify hyperlinks by a distinct color: 

• Red for an active link
• Purple for a visited link
• Blue for a standard link

Users who rely on screen readers can’t perceive link colors and need additional visual cues to distinguish hyperlinks from surrounding text. Underlining links is the most reliable solution and the approach WCAG recommends, as it works regardless of color settings or user preferences.

You should also use descriptive anchor text rather than generic phrases like “Read More.” Descriptive text tells users exactly where a link leads before they click it, which is essential for screen reader users who often navigate a page by jumping between links.

Frequently Asked Questions About ADA Font Size Requirements

Consider whether there’s a minimum font size for ADA compliance when choosing your branding and website design. These frequently asked questions may shed light on questions you have: 

What Is The ADA-Recommended Font Size?

There is no ADA-recommended font size or font type, only general best practice guidance from WCAG. The requirement is that your site visitors can read your text, and that it’s visible for those with visual impairments. 

Can a Website Be Considered Accessible If Users Can Resize the Text?

Text resizing is an important component of accessibility, but it’s not the determining factor of whether your site is ADA compliant. Your zoom option needs to ensure the layout remains intact and navigation remains usable. Accessibility is measured by whether users can actually read and navigate your content, not by whether a single feature is present. 

Do Font Size Issues Really Lead to ADA Accessibility Complaints or Lawsuits?

Yes. Court documents can cite font size as a reason for the lawsuit, but a list of other issues usually accompanies it. The complaint is that persons with disabilities can’t access or use the site as intended, not that the right font or font size was used. 

Does Font Size Alone Make a Website ADA Compliant or Non-Compliant?

No. Font size alone does not determine ADA compliance. Your site’s accessibility depends on its usability and on whether people with disabilities can read and use it effectively.

Font size is one part of a broader accessibility framework that includes contrast and text resizing. Your site can use an appropriate font size and still fail accessibility expectations if text cannot scale properly or becomes unusable when zoomed.

How Can I Tell If My Website’s Font Size Is an Accessibility Risk?

You can do a few basic checks to see if your font size needs readjusting: 

• Zoom your browser to 200 percent and confirm that text remains readable, navigation stays usable, and content does not overlap, disappear, or require horizontal scrolling.
• Check font behavior on mobile devices to ensure text scales naturally across screen sizes without forcing users to pinch, zoom, or rotate their device.
• Run automated accessibility tools to flag potential font size and text-scaling issues, understanding that these tools may miss real-world usability problems.
• Perform manual testing or an accessibility audit to identify how font size affects actual user experience and whether it contributes to broader accessibility risks.

If any of these checks reveal problems, addressing them early is far less costly than responding to a complaint or lawsuit after the fact.

Make Your Site ADA Compliant With Digital Authority Partners

Font size might seem like a minor detail when you’re designing your website, but getting it right makes your site more usable for everyone, including people with disabilities. The DOJ and courts rely on WCAG guidelines to determine whether you’re using an ADA compliant font size and meeting ADA standards. 

ADA compliance ensures people with disabilities can access websites fairly and equitably. Building a new site with the right specs or updating your existing one to meet the requirements might seem challenging, but at Digital Authority Partners (DAP), we’re equipped to help you stay compliant. We’ll run a full audit to check where your site falls short. Contact our team today to get your website ADA compliant.