Services · Accessibility

Website accessibility audit.

A real WCAG 2.2 AA audit. Automated tooling for the catchable issues, manual screen-reader testing for the rest — delivered as per-success-criterion conformance documentation and a prioritized remediation plan. Not a checklist run by a tool.

What does URCO actually do in a website accessibility audit?

We run the automated checks, then we open your site in a screen reader and try to use it. Both layers, on real user flows. The output is a per-success-criterion WCAG 2.2 AA conformance report, a prioritized issue register, a remediation roadmap, and the accessibility statement language to ship alongside it.

An honest accessibility audit has two layers: automated and manual. Automated tools — axe-core, WAVE, Lighthouse — are excellent at finding mechanically-detectable failures: missing alt text, contrast violations, missing form labels, ARIA misuse. They’re also fast and cheap, which is why URCO runs them on every PR and on every page.

Automated tools cap at roughly 30% of WCAG issues. The other 70% require human judgment — whether the alt text actually describes the image, whether keyboard focus order matches the visual order, whether a screen reader can complete the checkout flow, whether the modal releases focus correctly when dismissed. URCO’s audit covers both layers.

Two audit options

Free instant audit

Drop a URL at /audit. Returns a 100-point URCO Score in under 60 seconds across accessibility signals, technical SEO, mobile UX, conversion structure, tracking, content, and trust. Fully automated. Useful as a baseline, useful for triage, useful for “is this site obviously broken” — but not a substitute for the manual review when the question is whether your site holds up to a Section 504 review or an ADA demand letter.

Manual deep audit

Five business days. Per-success-criterion WCAG 2.2 AA review. Manual screen-reader testing on NVDA (Windows + Firefox), VoiceOver (macOS + Safari, iOS + Safari), and TalkBack (Android + Chrome). Manual keyboard testing on every interactive component and on every conversion path. Mobile testing at real touch-target sizes. Automated tooling runs alongside, with results consolidated.

Deliverable is a written report plus a 60-minute walkthrough call. Book at /audit/book.

What the deliverable looks like

Every URCO accessibility audit ships in the same shape, so the report is comparable across engagements and so the documentation matches what an investigator or counsel would expect to see:

  • Executive summary. One page. Conformance posture at WCAG 2.2 AA, top three risks, estimated remediation effort.
  • Per-success-criterion conformance table. All 50 WCAG 2.2 AA success criteria listed, marked conformant, partially conformant, or not applicable with the basis for each. This is the document a court would reference.
  • Issue register. Every finding, classified by severity (blocker, major, minor), location (URL + selector), WCAG criterion, recommended fix, and effort estimate.
  • Remediation roadmap. Issues grouped into phases — “ship this week,” “next sprint,” “next quarter” — based on severity and likely legal exposure, with effort estimates per phase.
  • Accessibility statement draft. Ready-to-publish language for your /accessibility page that references the audit findings and the remediation plan.
  • Walkthrough call. 60 minutes with whoever on your team will own the remediation — engineering, comms, ops — to walk the report and answer questions.

Who this is for

  • Public-facing businesses that want a defensible posture before a demand letter shows up.
  • Charter schools, K-12 districts, Montessori programs, and other Section 504-covered organizations that need to document conformance for a state review or federal funding report.
  • State and local government entities with a Title II compliance deadline (April 2026 for populations 50,000+, April 2027 for smaller).
  • Multi-location operators who need a baseline audit across a portfolio before centralizing platform decisions.
  • Companies that received a demand letter — the audit becomes the basis of the defensible-posture documentation. The ADA website lawsuit playbook covers the operational side of that scenario.

Related

FAQ

Accessibility audit — FAQ.

What's included in a URCO website accessibility audit?

Automated tooling (axe-core, WAVE, Lighthouse) plus manual screen-reader testing on NVDA, VoiceOver, and TalkBack across the actual user flows that matter — homepage, conversion paths, forms, key templates. Output is a per-success-criterion WCAG 2.2 AA conformance report, a prioritized issue register ranked by severity and likelihood of legal exposure, a remediation roadmap with effort estimates, and a 60-minute walkthrough call.

What's the difference between the free /audit scan and the manual deep audit?

The free instant audit at /audit is automated only — it runs Lighthouse, axe-core, and other automated checks across the surface of your site and returns a 100-point URCO Score in under 60 seconds. It's accurate enough to surface roughly 30% of WCAG issues, which is the upper limit of what automation can catch. The manual deep audit runs over five business days and includes the human screen-reader testing, manual interactive testing, and conformance documentation that closes the remaining 70%.

Why do I need a manual audit if I already have an overlay or an automated scanner?

Automated tools and overlays do not catch the failure modes that drive most ADA website lawsuits — keyboard traps in third-party widgets, custom interactive components without correct ARIA, form labels that look right visually but are not programmatically associated with their inputs, and meaningful images with auto-generated alt text that describes the file rather than the content. Industry consensus from accessibility experts is that automated coverage caps at about 30% of WCAG criteria. The manual audit is what gives you a defensible posture.

How does the audit deliverable hold up to a Section 504 or ADA review?

The report is structured as per-success-criterion conformance documentation against WCAG 2.2 AA — the same shape an investigator or plaintiff would expect to see. Conformant criteria are listed, partially conformant criteria include the partial-conformance basis, and not-applicable criteria explain why. The accessibility statement we draft for you references this report and a public contact path for accessibility issues. That documentation is the evidence base behind any defense.

Who runs the audit?

URCO is a small Arizona studio. The audit is run by the same team that builds and remediates websites for URCO clients — not a separate department, not outsourced. You get the practitioner perspective from people who fix what they find, not a checklist run by a junior reviewer.

How is pricing structured?

The free instant audit at /audit is free and takes under a minute. The manual deep audit is a fixed-scope engagement priced based on the size and complexity of the site — single-site small-business audits land at one tier, multi-page CMS-driven sites at another, multi-location or multi-brand at a third. The intake call after you book scopes the audit and quotes a fixed price; there is no hourly billing.

Do you also do the remediation, or just the audit?

Both, separately. The audit is a standalone deliverable — many clients run an audit with URCO and remediate in-house using the prioritized roadmap. For clients who prefer one team to handle both, URCO offers remediation engagements scoped against the audit findings. There is no obligation to use URCO for remediation just because we ran the audit.

Do you work with sites built on Wix, Squarespace, Webflow, or other DIY platforms?

Yes. The audit is platform-agnostic — WCAG 2.2 AA conformance is measured against the rendered output, not the editor. Some platforms make remediation easier than others. The honest assessment of each is in our insight on Wix, Squarespace, and Webflow accessibility — the platform itself is sometimes the bottleneck, and we'll say so in the audit.

(08) — Ready when you are

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