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Screen readers 0:31

A 31-second explainer of Screen readers, narrated over the same demo you can try yourself.

The Screen readers explainer. Prefer to do it yourself? Try the interactive demo.

Try the interactive Screen readers demo

What this video covers

A screen reader speaks or displays on-screen content via braille or speech, helping blind and low-vision users interact with a computer. Users navigate by jumping to headings, landmarks, links, form controls, tables and search - rarely reading from top to bottom. Good source order, accessible names and meaningful markup make that navigation possible.

Step through the layout the way a screen reader can and the neat 2D grid becomes a single-file queue - unless your headings and landmarks let people jump straight to what they want. That's why source order, accessible names and structure matter so much: by ear, they're what turn a linear stream into something navigable. The picture you see is not the page they get.

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