Mirela
Accessibility and localization are more similar than you’d think. They make it easier to understand and use a product, each in its own way. Below, we’ll see how they come together and how to create inclusive products for your international audience.
What do accessibility and localization have in common?
Accessibility is associated with making digital products usable by people with disabilities. Localization means to adapt a product for people who speak different languages or live in different regions.
If you build a software product that is available worldwide only in one language, technically, only users that speak that language can access it. The product gets difficult (or impossible) to use if your users don’t understand the information. The same principle applies to accessibility, as users with disabilities encounter barriers of their own if a product has not been made inclusive.
These two also intersect, because a multilingual product needs to make its translated content accessible, and accessibility features themselves may need to be localized. They need to work together.
Localization can affect accessibility
An important thing you need to know: Localization can do some “damage” to text length, reading direction, typography, dates and numbers, navigation, and even the way content is interpreted by assistive technologies. An interface that is accessible in its original language isn’t automatically accessible in every localized version, and that’s something you need to take care of.
Some of the main issues that can happen with localization are:
- Text expansion.
- Interface elements left untranslated.
- Localized content can change meaning.
- Different languages and writing systems.
- Screen readers can’t tell the correct language.
- RTL languages can change the user experience.
- Accessibility problems that weren’t visible before.
Accessibility and localization during the translation workflow
Accessibility is something you need to consider throughout the localization workflow. It’s not something you check after localization is complete, because by that point, accessibility issues may already be embedded in translated strings, UI layouts, or content structures.
Prepare the content for accessibility and localization
Devs should build interfaces that can accommodate different languages and accessibility needs from the beginning. This is called internationalization, and it’s what happens before localization. The product is designed so that language, text direction, date formats, number formats, and other locale-specific differences can be handled without rewriting the application.
You can prepare for localization by making sure:
- The strings are separated from source code.
- The interface supports text resizing.
- RTL languages are supported where relevant.
- The placeholders and variables are clearly defined.
- The UI elements accommodate longer translations.
- Accessibility-related strings are included in the localization system.
- Translators see enough context to understand how each string is used.
Give translators enough context
During the translation phase, context becomes the essential thing for producing accurate and usable translations. Make sure to provide enough screenshots, descriptions, comments, string identifiers, or other contextual information that can help translators make the right decision.
Protect placeholders and functional elements
Your localization workflow should also distinguish between translatable content and functional syntax. Localized strings often contain variables and placeholders that are processed by the application. Translators need to be able to translate the surrounding text without accidentally changing the variables that make the interface function.
If you’re not careful with this, accessibility might get affected. For example, a broken placeholder in an error message, notification, or status announcement can prevent the users from receiving essential information.
Check more than linguistic accuracy
During localization, we also need to look at language quality and interface behavior, not just the translations. You can have correct translations that still create an accessibility problem when they’re placed into the interface. If you perform linguistic QA along with UI and accessibility QA, you can identify whether a problem belongs to translation, design, development, or accessibility testing.
Run a localization and accessibility check
Before the release, it’s useful to run a combined checklist, looking at three aspects:
- Language: Check that all the required strings are translated, translations are reviewed, terminology is consistent, locale-specific formats are correct.
- Interface: Check that the text fits in its containers, there are no truncated labels or messages, the layout works with longer strings, RTL work correctly where applicable.
- Accessibility: Check that the accessibility labels are translated, the correct language is declared, keyboard interactions still work, screen readers receive meaningful labels and messages, users resize text without losing functionality.
How to make accessibility part of your localization
1. Design for localization → Don’t build an English-only UI and hope translation won’t break it.
2. Treat accessibility strings as translatable content → Take care of the alt text and ARIA labels from the start.
3. Give your translators context → They need to know whether a string is a button, tooltip, error message, heading, etc.
4. Test languages too → Make sure they don’t break the interface.
5. Test accessibility in every major locale → Just because one language passes accessibility testing, doesn’t mean that every localized version does too.
6. Automate what you can → Use localization tooling to identify missing translations, manage metadata, maintain context, and integrate localization into development workflows.
The role of localization tools
A localization management platform like POEditor is the infrastructure you need to incorporate accessibility into an existing workflow.
It’s a place where you keep accessibility-related content. A localization project may contain ARIA labels and descriptions, image alternative text, navigation instructions, accessibility-related notifications, and more. You have to keep them alongside other translatable content to identify much easier what needs to be translated, reviewed, and updated.
This tool also enables you to attach context to strings through comments, screenshots, or other references. This is really valuable for accessibility-related strings. If you give translators enough information to reduce ambiguity, they can produce translations that work for both the visible interface and the users who interact with it through assistive technologies.
When it comes to the technical elements embedded in strings, these too can be managed through localization platforms. You have to make it clear which parts of a string can be translated and which don’t. If you protect placeholders and other technical elements, you diminish the risk of a translation introducing a functional problem that could affect the user experience.
Accessibility can suffer when some parts of a localized interface remain untranslated. But rest assured—your localization gives visibility into which strings have been translated, which are missing, which need review, and which languages are ready for release.