An ADA compliant website, done properly
An ADA compliant website isn’t a badge you install or a widget you bolt on — it’s a site that genuinely works for people with disabilities. Curbcut makes your website conform to WCAG 2.1 AA by remediating the code itself: semantic structure, alternative text, color contrast, keyboard operability, focus management, and accessible forms. We fix the page a screen reader and a keyboard user actually encounter, then document it — so your compliance is real, testable, and defensible rather than cosmetic.
That distinction is the whole point. There is no official “ADA certified” stamp for websites. Compliance means the underlying HTML, ARIA, and content conform to the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines at Level AA — and the only way to get there is to repair the source.
What makes a website ADA compliant
The Americans with Disabilities Act doesn’t publish line-by-line web rules, so courts, the Department of Justice, and the W3C all point to the same technical yardstick: WCAG 2.1 Level AA. WCAG is organized around four principles — content must be perceivable, operable, understandable, and robust. In practice, an ADA compliant website meets each of these in the code:
- Perceivable. Every meaningful image has accurate alt text, video has captions, and text meets color contrast ratios so low-vision users can read it.
- Operable. Every control works with keyboard navigation alone, focus is always visible, and there are no keyboard traps — critical for users who can’t use a mouse.
- Understandable. Labels, instructions, and error messages are clear and announced to assistive technology.
- Robust. Markup uses native HTML where possible and correct ARIA only where it can’t, so a screen reader announces content in a logical order.
Level A is the floor and AAA is aspirational; AA is the practical and legal target nearly every U.S. business should aim for. An accessibility audit measures your site against each AA success criterion so you know exactly where you stand before anyone touches the code.
Who needs an ADA compliant website
If you operate a public-facing business website in the U.S., ADA Title III very likely applies to you — courts have applied it to commercial sites even though the law predates the modern web. You especially need real compliance if:
- You’ve received an ADA demand letter or a lawsuit threat. Understand the lawsuit risk →
- You run an e-commerce store, where every product page, cart, and checkout is a potential barrier — and a high-value target for serial plaintiffs.
- You want to remove legal exposure proactively and serve the roughly one in four American adults who live with a disability.
The litigation wave overwhelmingly targets small and mid-sized businesses, not just the Fortune 500, precisely because their sites are easy to test and rarely remediated. A widget won’t change that calculus; fixing the page will.
What we deliver
A complete engagement takes you from “we have no idea where we stand” to documented, defensible conformance:
- A manual + automated accessibility audit against WCAG 2.1 AA — automated scanners catch only part of the criteria, so we test the rest by hand with NVDA, JAWS, and VoiceOver.
- Manual remediation of every finding in your actual codebase — templates, components, and content — not a script layered on top.
- A VPAT / Accessibility Conformance Report documenting exactly which criteria your site meets.
- A published accessibility statement for your site.
- Optional ongoing monitoring so new content and updates don’t quietly reintroduce barriers.
This is the same work covered in depth on our accessibility remediation and ADA compliance services pages — the latter being the full audit-to-monitoring engagement.
Our process: audit, remediate, document, monitor
We work in a tight, transparent loop so you always know what’s changing and why.
- Audit. We start with an accessibility audit — automated tooling plus manual screen-reader and keyboard testing — to produce a prioritized list of every WCAG 2.1 AA failure. You can’t fix what you haven’t found.
- Remediate. Our team fixes each issue in your real code, working from the highest-impact barriers (blockers for screen-reader and keyboard users) down, and following your platform’s existing patterns so nothing breaks.
- Document. We verify the fixes with assistive technology, then deliver a VPAT / Accessibility Conformance Report and an accessibility statement that back your conformance claim with evidence.
- Monitor. Accessibility decays as you publish. Optional monitoring catches regressions early so the site stays conformant.
How long it takes
There’s no single number, because a five-page brochure site and a 5,000-SKU store are not the same job. As a general guide, most small-business sites move through audit and a focused remediation sprint in a few weeks; template-heavy sites, large catalogs, and e-commerce stores take longer. We don’t guess up front — the audit scopes a firm timeline (and a fixed price) from the real findings, so you’re never committing to an open-ended project.
Why manual remediation beats overlays
Overlay vendors promise instant compliance from one line of JavaScript. It doesn’t hold up. The script can’t see your design intent, can’t reliably fix dynamic content, and frequently interferes with the assistive technology users already rely on — and courts have ruled against sites that leaned on a widget instead of fixing the page. An overlay masks symptoms at runtime; it never repairs the ARIA, semantics, and contrast a screen reader actually reads.
Manual remediation repairs the source so the fix is permanent, testable, and defensible: a blind user’s screen reader announces your content in logical order, a keyboard-only user can reach every control with a visible focus ring, and your conformance is backed by a real VPAT rather than a marketing badge. We lay out the full evidence on whether accessibility overlays work.
What it costs
Cost is driven by three things: page count, how the site was built, and how many WCAG failures the audit finds. A small brochure site is far cheaper than a complex store, and a clean, well-structured codebase remediates faster than one full of generic <div> markup. Rather than quote blind, we turn the audit findings into a fixed price. See what ADA compliance costs for the full breakdown of what moves the number.
Works with your platform
We remediate within your existing stack — no rebuild, no migration. Whether you’re on Shopify, WordPress, or Wix, we fix the accessibility barriers in your theme, templates, and content while respecting how the platform works.
The fastest way to find out where you stand is a free accessibility scan — we’ll show you exactly which WCAG 2.1 AA barriers exist on your site, then fix them by hand. (This page is general information, not legal advice; talk to a qualified attorney about your specific exposure.)