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Accessibility vs emojis
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Emojis are in every corner of the internet. Everyone I know uses emojis, all the way from my grandparents to my friend’s 5 year old brother. Personally, I use emojis daily. I’ll throw a couple of them in while I’m talking to friends or trying to add some pizazz to social media comments. I’d bet it’s safe to say that you use them as well — or at least know people who do. Emojis can be a great and fun way to convey emotions. They also add visual interest and can be a quick way to say a lot in a single character. That being said — how do emojis fare for those who can’t see them?
According to the World Health Organization, “at least 2.2 billion people have a near or distance vision impairment.” In order to be inclusive to all degrees of sight (or lack thereof), we need to know how to communicate in an accessible manner.
Emojis can be read aloud to users with the power of screen readers. If emojis are used right, they can still convey all of the emotion and context intended, despite not being visible. Before we can determine how to best use emojis, let’s figure out what emojis “look” like to screen readers.
Screen readers read off an emojis Unicode String in order to identify it. This is similar to ALT text on images.
I highly recommend you watch the video linked below by Molly Burke. She gives us a glimpse into how visually impaired people “see” emojis.
Accessible emoji usage
In order to use emojis in a way that are beneficial to everyone, I’m going to give you a few tips on how to use them. At an emojis best, they can add fun and context to a post or message. At their worst, they can cause frustration and abandonment.
