European Accessibility Act for online stores: what to do

The European Accessibility Act (EAA) has applied since 28 June 2025, and e-commerce is one of the services it covers. If you sell to consumers in the EU, your store should be usable by people with disabilities, unless you qualify for the microenterprise exemption. Enforcement is now visible, so treat accessibility as a regular maintenance task, not a legal footnote.

What has happened since it started applying

Regulators and courts in several member states have begun to act. The Dutch consumer authority (ACM) reported in March 2026 on a test of about 100 of the largest Dutch webshops and found that a majority could not be used to place an order with assistive technology. The Swedish regulator (PTS) opened supervision cases into large online shops, checking pages such as the home page, a product page and search. In France, associations filed court actions against large retailers, and at least one court has ordered a retailer to fix its website and app within a deadline. Procedures and penalties differ by country, and the details evolve, so check your national regulator.

Who is covered

• E-commerce services aimed at consumers in the EU, including stores based elsewhere that sell there.
• Microenterprises (fewer than 10 people and annual turnover or balance sheet of up to EUR 2 million) are exempt from the service requirements. Crossing those thresholds ends the exemption.

This is general information, not legal advice. Confirm your situation with a qualified adviser.

What to aim for

The harmonised standard is EN 301 549, which is built on WCAG. For a store, a practical target is WCAG 2.2 level AA, applied first to the pages that carry a purchase: home page, category and search, product page, cart and checkout.

A starting checklist

1. Test a full purchase with a keyboard only. You should reach every control, see where focus is, and complete checkout.
2. Add alt text to meaningful product images.
3. Label every form field, especially in checkout and account forms.
4. Declare the page language with the lang attribute.
5. Give links and buttons descriptive names, not "click here" or an icon with no text.
6. Use proper landmarks and headings so screen reader users can navigate.
7. Check colour contrast and text resizing, which need manual or dedicated tooling.
8. Publish an accessibility statement and a way to report problems.

For the basics behind items 2 to 6, see accessibility basics for online stores. Keep the cart reachable and clearly labelled too: add-to-cart button and cart page.

How Averifly helps

Averifly's accessibility rules check what can be read from your pages' HTML: images missing alt text, a missing lang attribute, no main landmark, links with no or ambiguous text, and form fields without labels. They do not replace a full audit, since colour contrast and focus order are not covered yet. See our rules, then run a free scan to find the quick wins.