by Daniel Parker, RDPFS Contributor:
As the technology landscape continues to evolve, so do accessibility needs, as well as the ways we adapt to new challenges. One development is the increasing number of people with vision loss who prefer to use mobile apps as opposed to websites, according to survey results from the Web Accessibility in Mind (WebAIM) project of Utah State University. Survey participants, who included those with and without disabilities, were asked: “When performing common online tasks such as banking or shopping are you most likely to use a mobile app or the web site?” Out of 1,470 respondents to this question, 852 (58%) preferred using apps, compared with 618 (42%) who mostly used websites. This preference has increased over the years, from 46% in 2017 to 51% in 2021. A related question about the use of desktop versus mobile platforms found that 49.5% use both regularly, compared with 40.2% who used desktop and 10.2% who preferred mobile. “There was almost no change to responses to this question compared to the 2019 survey.” Other survey responses may elucidate the reason for this apparent increase in app usage. Specifically, 77% of respondents with disabilities feel that the accessibility of web content is worsening, and 85.9% said that better websites, rather than improved assistive technology, would have the biggest impact on their experience. Since apps are developed specifically for use with mobile devices, and web browsers do not function as intermediaries, their accessibility features can be customized and tailored in ways that websites can’t. This is the reasoning behind resources like AppleVis’s app directories. These make it possible for iPhone and iPad users to find accessible apps by name or category, as well as find out if an app they are considering is inaccessible. The user can even sort by accessibility rating through that page’s advanced search.
