That figure counts detectable failures found by an automated analysis. The WebAIM Million report states that the absence of detected errors does not indicate that a page is accessible or conformant.
Accessibility
Accessible website design that aims to meet WCAG 2.1 AA, then is audited to it
RAMZ Creative designs, builds and audits each site itself for ADA accessibility. This page is for a business owner who wants to know what that audit checks, what the law says and does not say, and what the Federal Trade Commission did about one accessibility plug-in.
The numbers
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95.9 %of home pages had detectable WCAG 2 failures
The 2026 WebAIM Million, an annual automated analysis of 1,000,000 home pages run in February 2026.
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56.1 detected errors on the average home page
The same 2026 WebAIM Million analysis.
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3,117 federal website accessibility lawsuits in 2025
Counted by the law firm Seyfarth Shaw, up 27% from 2,452 in 2024.
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Over 1 in
4 US adults reported having a disability in 2022
Over 70 million people, according to a CDC report from July 2024.
What RAMZ checks
RAMZ audits to WCAG 2.1 AA. The audit has three parts.
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Automated checks of the markup
RAMZ runs automated checks of the markup. The 2026 WebAIM Million lists missing alternative text for images on 53.1% of home pages, missing form input labels on 51%, empty links on 46.3%, empty buttons on 30.6% and missing document language on 13.5%. The W3C says evaluation tools cannot check all accessibility aspects automatically, can produce false or misleading results, and need human judgment alongside them.
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A keyboard walk through every page
RAMZ walks through every page with a keyboard. Section508.gov, the US federal government's accessibility site, says automated tools cannot apply human judgment, so they either produce many false positives or, when tuned to avoid them, test only a small share of requirements. It adds that requirements a tool cannot test must be tested manually.
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Color contrast, visible focus and reflow, as rendered
RAMZ checks the rendered color contrast, the visible focus and how the page reflows. Low contrast text was the most common failure in the WebAIM Million, found on 83.9% of home pages.
What the law says and does not
The US Department of Justice's web guidance, dated March 18, 2022, said the ADA covers state and local governments under Title II and businesses open to the public under Title III, and that Title III requirements apply to the goods, services, privileges or activities of those businesses, including ones offered on the web.
The Department's final rule, published in the Federal Register on April 24, 2024, names WCAG Version 2.1, Level AA as the technical standard for the web content and mobile apps of state and local governments under Title II. The April 2024 web rule is a rule for governments.
For businesses, the same March 2022 guidance said the Department had no regulation setting detailed web accessibility standards, that businesses and state and local governments had flexibility in how they comply, and that it named the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines and the Section 508 Standards as existing technical standards that can help, without requiring either one.
The FTC order on one accessibility plug-in
On January 3, 2025 the Federal Trade Commission announced a proposed order requiring the seller of an AI-powered website accessibility plug-in to pay $1 million. The Commission alleged that the seller's claim the tool could make any website compliant with WCAG was false, misleading or unsubstantiated, because many user websites did not become compliant. The Commission's April 22, 2025 release says it voted 3-0 to approve the order as final, and the order bars the company from claiming its automated products can make any website WCAG-compliant, or keep it compliant over time, unless it has evidence to support the claim.
RAMZ does not install accessibility overlays or toolbars; it builds accessibility into the templates.
What WCAG 2.1 AA asks for
Four principles, three levels
WCAG 2.1 organizes its success criteria under four principles: perceivable, operable, understandable and robust. It sorts them into three conformance levels, A, AA and AAA, with A the lowest and AAA the highest.
What Level AA requires
The W3C published WCAG 2.1 on June 5, 2018. To conform to WCAG 2.1 at Level AA, a web page has to satisfy all of the Level A and all of the Level AA success criteria, or provide a conforming alternate version. The W3C does not recommend requiring Level AAA as a general policy for entire sites, because some content cannot satisfy every Level AAA criterion.
What 2.1 added
WCAG 2.1 added 17 success criteria to WCAG 2.0, 5 at Level A, 7 at Level AA and 5 at Level AAA. The Level AA additions are Orientation, Identify Input Purpose, Reflow, Non-Text Contrast, Text Spacing, Content on Hover or Focus and Status Messages.
Questions about accessible website design
What does Arizona's accessible technology statute cover?
Arizona Revised Statutes section 18-132 requires state budget units, which are state entities, that develop, buy, maintain or use electronic or information technology with state money to make it accessible to people with disabilities, unless that would impose an undue burden; it applies to state entities and does not mention private businesses.
Will RAMZ promise an ADA compliant website?
No. RAMZ does not claim a site is legally compliant, and the goal is to meet or pass WCAG 2.1 AA. RAMZ never claims to be certified.
When must governments meet the Department of Justice web rule?
Under the web rule for state and local governments, as extended by an interim final rule published April 20, 2026, governments serving 50,000 or more people must comply by April 26, 2027, and governments serving fewer than 50,000 people, and special district governments, must comply by April 26, 2028.
How many website accessibility lawsuits are filed?
Seyfarth Shaw says website accessibility cases were 36% of all federal ADA Title III lawsuits in 2025, up from 28% in 2024. It counts federal filings only, and says state court demand letters and lawsuits are not in its numbers and are especially common against businesses with physical locations. A vendor that sells accessibility products and tracks lawsuits says more than 5,000 digital accessibility lawsuits were filed in 2025, with 3,100-plus federal filings and nearly 2,000 cases in New York and California state courts combined. The vendor's higher total includes state court cases.
How large are the companies sued?
The same vendor says 36 percent of the companies sued in 2025 reported annual revenue above $25 million, and its chart labels the other 64% as companies with less than $25 million in annual revenue.
Where are the federal lawsuits filed?
In Seyfarth Shaw's count of 2025 federal website accessibility lawsuits, New York federal courts had 1,021, Florida 961 and Illinois 585, and Seyfarth Shaw's count gives no figure for Arizona.
How common is each type of disability among US adults?
A CDC infographic citing its Disability and Health Data System lists the most common disability types among US adults as cognition at 13.9%, mobility at 12.2%, independent living at 7.7%, hearing at 6.2%, vision at 5.5% and self-care at 3.6%.
Does accessibility cost extra?
Every Revenue Engine tier includes accessibility; it is never a separate line item. What the Revenue Engine costs is on its own page.
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