PDF Accessibility Guidelines
- An accessible PDF is a document that can be accurately navigated and read by a screen reader.
- What makes a PDF document accessible? Correct tagging. Tags provide a logical structure to how the content is presented through assistive technology (like a screen reader). A correctly tagged PDF is accessible to everyone.
- What is a tag? A tag is behind the scenes code that is added to PDFs to identify types of content and store some attributes related to it. Tags also arrange the document into a hierarchical structure. This adds order to the content of the PDF (like headings, paragraphs, lists, footnotes, images and tables).
- For a PDF to be considered accessible it must have proper tags.
To create and edit accessible PDFs you will need Adobe Acrobat Pro from the Adobe Creative Suit. There are built in accessibility tools that can be added to your toolbar to make editing easier. Recommended tools are the Action Wizard, Accessibility and Prepare Form toolbars.
To add these tools:
- Open Adobe Acrobat Pro
- On the far righthand side click on "More Tools"
- Each tool can be found in a category:
- Forms & Signatures has Prepare Form
- Protect & Standardize has Accessibility
- Customize has the Action Wizard
- Once the tool is located, click "Add." This will create a shortcut to the tool in your toolbar.
- When creating a PDF from a Word document, begin by making sure the Word document is accessible.
- Save the document as a PDF.
- Open the saved PDF in Adobe Acrobat (you will need Acrobat Acrobat Pro to create accessible PDFs).
- Set the document title and language. To do this:
- File > Properties > Description tab and add a concise title > switch to the Advanced tab and set the Language under "Reading Options" > select "OK" to save the changes.
- File > Properties > Description tab and add a concise title > switch to the Advanced tab and set the Language under "Reading Options" > select "OK" to save the changes.
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Tagging a PDF
- Begin by checking the tags to ensure they align with your content. The Tag panel will be on the lefthand side of the screen and the tool looks like a little price tag.
- Are Heading level 1 all labeled as H1? Are paragraphs labeled as P tags? See the table of common PDF tags below.
Element Adobe PDF Tag Heading H1, H2, H3, H4, H5, H6 Paragraph P Picture/Image Figure Table Table, TH, TR, TD List L, LI, Lbl, LBody Hyperlink Link Form Elements Form Reference Reference Footnote Note Mathematic Formula Formula - If the tags do not coincide with what was created in Word, there are 3 options you can use to correct this.
- Autotag the PDF. To do this, open the Accessibility tool and select "Autotag Document."
- Use the Action Wizard Accessibility Wizard. To do this, open the Action Wizard tool and select "Make Accessible." There are several prompts to follow for this tool; be sure to complete them all.
- Manually tag the PDF. This is the most time consuming, but most accurate, way of creating an accessible PDF.
- Begin by checking the tags to ensure they align with your content. The Tag panel will be on the lefthand side of the screen and the tool looks like a little price tag.
As with any other digital resource, alt text needs to be added to any non-text elements that add to the content or context of the resource. To find more information about alt text (what it is, why it is necessary, how to create good alt text, etc) please look at the Alternative (Alt) Text Guide.
There are a few ways to add alt text to a PDF in Adobe Acrobat.
- When using the Accessibility Wizard, one of the steps it takes is finding any images/non-text elements in the PDF. The Wizard then prompts you to add alt-text or mark the image as decorative.
- Manually add alt text through the "Properties" menu. To do this:
- Go to the Tags Menu.
- Find the figure you want to tag and expand the tag to show the image property.
- Right click on the image tag and select "Properties." A dialog box will open that allows you to add Alt Text, image title and more.
- Running the accessibility checker and correcting any alt text errors.
- If an alt text error is detected, expand the Alternate Text element and locate the list of figure element(s) that failed.
- Right click on each individual element and select "fix."
- This will open the alt text dialog box where you can enter alt text or mark the image as decorative.
- If an alt text error is detected, expand the Alternate Text element and locate the list of figure element(s) that failed.
When creating an accessible PDF form from a Word document, begin by saving the Word document as a PDF. Open the PDF in Adobe Acrobat, go to Tools > Accessibility > Run Form Field Recognition to detect form fields and make them interactive (fillable).
Forms can also be created directly in Adobe Acrobat. Here is a step-by-step guide from Acrobat on creating forms from scratch in the tool.
A good guideline to follow when creating accessible PDFs is running the Accessibility Check that can be found in Adobe Acrobat. Running this check prior to beginning any work on the PDF can assist in finding easy to correct errors before any auto-tagging or manual tagging is done. Once remediations to the PDF have been completed, run the Accessibility Check again.
