WCAG Compliance Checklist for Wix Sites (Austria)

Why Accessibility Matters on Wix Right Now

Wix makes it easy to build a professional site quickly, but the platform's drag-and-drop editor can hide accessibility problems until they affect your users. From June 28, 2025, the European Accessibility Act (EAA) enforcement begins, and websites that fail basic WCAG 2.1 Level AA standards face legal exposure and customer complaints. This checklist covers the six issues we see most often in Wix sites built by small Austrian businesses — they're all fixable in minutes.

The Six Essential Checks

Image Alt Text

What to check: Every image on your site should have a description that explains what it shows, so screen reader users and search engines understand it.

How to check this on Wix: Click any image, open the Inspector panel on the right, find "Alt Text," and confirm it's filled in with a clear, specific description (not just the filename or "image").

• Go through every page and search for images without alt text
• Alt text should be 125 characters or fewer and describe what the image shows, not "click here" or "image"
• Decorative images (spacers, dividers) should have empty alt text — don't add text to them
• Screenshot images need descriptions of what information they show

Color Contrast

What to check: Text must be dark enough against its background so people with low vision or color blindness can read it without strain.

How to check this on Wix: Select any text element, check its foreground color and background color in the Designer panel, then use a free online contrast checker (like WebAIM Contrast Checker) to confirm the ratio is at least 4.5:1 for normal text or 3:1 for large text (18pt+).

• Light gray text on white, or dark blue on black, often fails this check
• Hover states and button text are common problem areas — check those too
• If you use background images behind text, check contrast against the darkest part of the image
• Buttons and links must meet the same contrast requirement as body text

Form Labels

What to check: Every form field (name, email, phone, message box) must have a visible label that tells users what to enter.

How to check this on Wix: Click on a form field, open the field settings, and confirm that "Label" has text (not empty) and that the label appears on the page next to or above the input box.

• Placeholder text ("Enter your name here") is not a label — you need actual label text
• The label should be positioned directly beside or above the field
• Hidden labels are only acceptable if you label the field for screen readers through the field's accessibility settings
• Contact forms and newsletter signup boxes are the places we see missing labels most often

Link Names

What to check: Every link on your page must have clear text that explains where it goes or what happens when clicked.

How to check this on Wix: Hover over or click every link, button, and icon. Ask: would someone know where this link goes if they only heard the text read aloud (no visual context)?

• "Click here" and "Read more" are too vague — rewrite as "Read our COVID-19 policy" or "View pricing plans"
• Icon-only buttons (hamburger menu, social media icons) need either visible text or a hidden label
• Links that are images must have alt text that describes the link destination
• Empty links or links that only contain a space character are common in Wix sites using custom code

HTML Document Language

What to check: Your site's main HTML tag must declare that it's in German (or whatever language your pages are in) so screen readers and search engines know how to interpret it.

How to check this on Wix: In your Wix site settings, go to SEO > General, and confirm that "Language" is set to "Deutsch" (or the correct language for your content).

• Wix usually sets this correctly by default, but verify it's not set to English if you're writing in German
• If you have pages in multiple languages, each page should declare its own language separately
• This is especially important for Austrian sites using German with regional terms

Button Labels

What to check: Every button must have clear text that says what it does — not just an icon or empty space.

How to check this on Wix: Click every button on your site (including the hamburger menu, play buttons, close buttons in popups). If you can't read plain English or German text that says what the button does, it's missing a label.

• Icon buttons (magnifying glass for search, X for close) need either visible text or a hidden label
• Common missing labels: mobile menu toggles, lightbox close buttons, video play buttons
• In Wix, add button text in the element settings or use the Inspector's "Aria Label" field for icon-only buttons
• Buttons that are images also need alt text describing what they do

Next Steps

Start by running through each section on your live site — use a screen reader (like NVDA, free) or keyboard-only navigation to catch problems you might miss visually. Wix's built-in accessibility checker (Settings > SEO > Accessibility Checker) will flag some of these issues, but it doesn't catch everything. Once you've fixed these six areas, your site will meet the baseline WCAG 2.1 Level AA standard that the EAA requires. Document your fixes so you have a record of your accessibility effort.

This is technical WCAG guidance, not legal advice.