With the constant involvement in the digital landscape, where smartphones and tablets have become constant companions, ensuring that the website excels on every mobile screen is no longer an option but a vitally important need. Ensuring proper functionality and compatibility over multiple platforms requires a testing method that can fulfill these criteria and ensure accessibility compliance to the testers. This is where mobile website testing outshines the testers and stands out to be a reliable testing approach.
Mobile website testing can be defined as a practice of testing websites or web applications over diverse mobile browsers. This article will cover why testers should perform mobile website testing, later on, it will also cover the methods for carrying out mobile website testing so that accessibility compliance is also ensured. While discussing our topic we will also cover accessibility testing and compliance. So let’s embark on this article.
What Is Mobile Website Testing?
Primarily, mobile website testing can be inferred to testing a website or web application to ensure its correct functionality across websites and also aids in facilitating an enhanced user experience on several mobile devices including tablets and smartphones.
Most importantly it helps testers establish and check the performance and appearance of a web application over various mobile browsers including Safari, Chrome, Opera, and many more. This testing method is also known as mobile web responsiveness testing and has proven benefits in providing a competitive edge in the digital era.
Mobile website testing doesn’t only revolve around excellent functionality but also has an impactful and positive approach to crafting an enhanced experience from the start. From providing a flawless responsiveness to lightning-fast loading time.
Why Should Testers Perform Mobile Website Testing?
The amount of content that users are consuming daily from different devices and browsers is rapidly increasing. And with this expanding majority of the global population owning smartphones, mobile website testing cannot be ignored. As many browsers have different screen resolutions which in turn demands maximized functionality of the website to run properly across each one of them.
And if the website is not responsive, then the users might never return to these sites again. Also if the websites are not tested promptly, then bugging and bad user experience can also occur simultaneously. Along with that, slower load time can even lead to decreased trust among the users. A website that is perfected for mobile can add many benefits like a flawless testing experience to the testers.
Testers can also face challenges regarding SEO implications as many search engines give utmost importance to mobile-friendly websites. So if a website isn’t optimized it may limit its visibility and demand.
What Is Accessibility Testing?
Accessibility testing is the process of examining how easily a website can be used by users with disabilities. Web accessibility testing makes it easy for users with disabilities to understand, navigate, and interact with a website.
Accessibility compliance can be defined as the process of maintaining guidelines and standards that ensure digital content, products, and services are accessible to all individuals including those with disabilities. This means separating all the blockage and complications and building a non-discriminative experience for all users despite their disabilities.
Benefits Of Ensuring Accessibility Compliance In Mobile Website Testing
Ensuring accessibility compliance in mobile website testing provides a plethora of benefits to the testers and developers It modifies user experiences, expands the audience reach, and bestows a successful website to the testers. Ensuring accessibility compliance in mobile website testing offers a diverse range of benefits that outstretch beyond the limits of regulatory requirements.
Increasing the audience reach, along with financial benefits, enhancing user experience, boosting brand reputation, optimizing SEO performance, fostering innovation, and promoting digital environment accessibility to all users leads to overall success for the website adversely.
Improved User Experience
Accessibility compliance in mobile website testing has a huge role in improving user experience. It efficiently aids disabled users like the ones who are visually challenged and suffer from motor disabilities, to have a more welcoming environment where they can easily navigate and interact. Features like screen reader compatibility, alternative text for images, and keyboard navigation options enhance usability, making interactions smoother and more intuitive for all users.
Broader Audience Reach
In addition to that, accessibility compliance also helps testers in expanding their audience reach. By being considerate of users who depend on assistive technologies like voice commands, screen readers, and magnification tools, testers can easily increase their website reach to a larger audience.
Legal And Regulatory Benefits
Beyond expansive reach, accessibility compliance also compiles some legal and regulatory benefits. Numerous countries have laws like the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) in the United States and globally as the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG), that instruct that digital content, even mobile websites, should be accessible to all users.
Search Engine Optimization
In addition, accessibility improvements usually line up with search engine optimization (SEO) compatibilities. Clear headings, structured content, descriptive links, and other elements not only enhance accessibility but also improve the overall ranking and findability of the mobile website in search engine results.
This collaboration between accessibility and SEO can contribute to increased organic traffic and online visibility.
Fostering Innovation And Future-Proofing
Ultimately, integrating accessibility compliance into mobile website testing paves the way for innovation and future-proofing. By embracing accessible design technologies and principles in the early stages of the development cycle, testers can build a solid foundation for future updates and enhancements.
Key Practices To Ensure Accessibility Compliance In Mobile Website Testing
In mobile website testing ensuring accessibility demands some key practices and considerations to make certain that all users, including those with disabilities, can direct and interact effectively with the website. Some crucial steps to ensure accessibility compliance with mobile website testing are
Be Aware Of Accessibility Guidelines
The first and foremost step to approaching accessibility compliance in mobile website testing is to adjust and adapt beforehand to accessibility guidelines like the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG).
These guidelines help in providing web content accessible to users with disabilities by using some criteria and recommendations. So testers can take notes from these guidelines and understand how these guidelines can be implemented in mobile devices and hence these guidelines can be easily embraced into their testing strategy.
Carry On Tests With Assistive Technologies
So another important aspect for ensuring accessibility compliance in mobile website testing is to make use of assistive technologies and also carry on tests with these technologies. Assistive technologies that are commonly opted for mobile devices by testers include screen readers like TalkBack for Android and VoiceOver for iOS.
Second is alternative input methods like voice commands and keyboard navigation. Also make sure that all the interactive elements, content, and navigation controls, are understandable and easily accessible through these technologies.
Ensure Responsive Design
Ensuring accessibility compliance also demands that the website’s responsive designs are cautiously adapted to different screen sizes and orientations. Also, testers need to make sure how interactive elements and navigation menus act on smaller screens and how the content reflows on these screens. Try abstaining from fixed-width layouts that may not scale effectively on mobile devices.
Look Over Text Clarity And Contrast
Testers need to make sure that the test on the website is readable effortlessly and also has enough contrast, especially when dealing with smaller screens. To check color contrast ratios opt for tools that ensure the text is readable under different lighting conditions. Also, think about font size adjustments and allow users to opt for resizing the text option if required.
Opting For A Cloud-Based Platform
Developers and testers can streamline their accessibility compliance in the mobile website testing process by opting for a cloud-based testing platform. A multitude of these platforms are available. One such robust cloud-based application and website testing platform is LambdaTest, which offers many compelling reasons to go with it.
LambdaTest is a cross-browser compatibility testing platform that supports many browsers including the Firefox browser online which in turn enables access to website content to users with physically disabled users.
LambdaTest is an AI-powered test orchestration and execution platform that allows testers to run manual and automated tests at scale. This robust platform also enables testers to carry on both real-time and automation testing over 3000 environments and real mobile devices, hence making it a compatible choice among the testers and developers.
LambdaTest also assists in screen reader testing, which is vital for checking how users who are visually impaired and other impairments experience the mobile website. It also has color contrast checking features which are very beneficial to users with low vision or color blindness. Testers can evaluate compliance with accessibility standards like WCAG. Another feature that it provides is keyboard navigation testing capabilities for users with motor disabilities and many other features that outshine this testing platform.
Ease Test Form Accessibility
When it comes to mobile website testing and ensuring accessibility compliance, testing forms act as an important and interactive element on websites. Make sure that all the form fields are correctly labeled by using label-related elements that are vital for screen readers. Verify that form validation messages are clear and understandable and that users can complete and submit forms using assistive technologies.
Check Out Multimedia Accessibility
Check out and evaluate the accessibility of multimedia content like audio and videos. Enable captions for videos and for audio content to provide transcripts to make room for users who are deaf and hearing impaired. Thus make sure that these multimedia controls are operable and easily accessible on mobile devices.
Test Navigation And Focus Management
To have hands-on test navigation, enable all interactive elements, including buttons and links, to be easily accessible through keyboard navigation. For better focus management, make sure that the focus order is understood and logical so that the users can easily navigate through the website without stumbling across keyboard traps or focus issues.
Consider Touch Target Size And Spacing
To accommodate touch inputs on touchscreens, enable the interactive elements like buttons and links to have sufficient size and spacing between them. Try out for touch target sizes that fit well to the accessibility standards so that accidental taps are prevented and improved usability is offered to users with motor impairments.
Verify Compatibility Across Devices And Browsers
As different browsers and operating systems may differently enact accessibility features, rigorous cross-browser testing becomes crucial. Testing the mobile website on different mobile browsers like Safari, Chrome, and Firefox, and various devices like Android, and iOS helps testers ensure consistent accessibility across these devices.
Carry On User Testing
Testers need to include users with disabilities during the testing process so that direct feedback on accessibility issues can be collected. And accessibility compliance is accomplished.
Also, carry on usability testing sessions in which users can explore the website smoothly using assistive technologies and thus give insights about the user experience. Fix any accessibility obstacles detected during these sessions.
So implementing these key aspects while carrying out mobile website testing can help testers ensure accessibility compliance. Also, it will enable testers to ensure that the website is inclusive and accessible to all users despite their disability.
Taking provident action to ensure accessibility compliance will not only help in achieving legal requirements but also foster user experience and extend the website’s usability and reach.
Conclusion
In conclusion, it can be said that ensuring accessibility compliance in mobile website testing does not solely revolve around regulatory requirements but is a vital component in building a feasible and easy-to-adapt digital experience. To all the users. This compliance makes sure that the website is fit for use by all kinds of users including those with disabilities. Hence promotes a feeling of equality and enhanced user experience.