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Microsoft Word Document Accessibility Guide

Use each section below to assist you in creating new documents or modifying existing ones to be more accessible.

Accessible documents use styles to give consistency, have sans serif fonts, contain section headings, provide descriptions for charts, graphs and tables, use phrases to describe hyperlinks, and group items into lists.

Headings (Styles)

Instructions

toolbar from Microsoft Word with Heading1 highlighted

  • Use Styles to apply and format document headings.
  • Use the bullet and numbering function for  lists (numbers if there is an order,  otherwise bullets).

Text-based Tutorials

Video Tutorials

Text

Instructions

font selection in Microsoft Word

  • Use a minimum 12 point font size.
  • All text should be left aligned.
  • Sans serif fonts are best.
  • Avoid large amounts of italic and all BLOCK CAPITAL LETTERS. 
  • Use sufficient contrast (visual presentation of text and images of text should have a contrast ratio of at least 7:1).

Text Based Tutorials

Video Tutorials

Images

Instructions

alt text window from Microsoft Word

  • Add alternative text (a narrative description) to images.
  • Avoid images that are text (e.g. scanned PDF files).
  • Use text equivalents for charts, maps, and diagrams.
  • Avoid floating items - use "inline" to display images, charts, graphs, etc.

Text Based Tutorials

Video Tutorials

Links

Instructions

hyperlink button selected on Microsoft Word toolbar

Text Based Tutorials

Video Tutorials

Tables

Instructions

insert table selected in a Microsoft Word menu

  • Tables should be used for tabular data.
  • Do not use tables for layout.
  • Do not merge table cells.
  • One piece of data per table cell.
  • Text boxes in Microsoft Word are not accessible.

Text Based Tutorials

Video Tutorials

Additional Resources

This comprehensive guide by Microsoft should help you with most accessibility issues in Word 365.

These guides walk you through the major steps in creating accessible Word documents.

Some screenshots and descriptions used from: Accessible Digital Office Documents (ADOD) Project (Inclusive Design Research Centre (IDRC) opens in a new window) / CC BY-SA opens in a new window

Accessible documents by opens in a new window Tom Smith opens in a new window, Blind Foundation CC-BY opens in a new window