Accessibility is cheaper when it is designed in

Accessibility usually enters a project as a compliance email with a deadline attached. By then the palette is locked, the components are built, the layout is fixed — and every fix is expensive, contested and visible.

Handled while designing, most of it is free. It is a set of constraints applied at the moment a decision is made, not a set of repairs made after.

Five checks that catch most of it

None of these need specialist tooling. They need doing at the right time, which is before the colour goes into the token file.

• Contrast: validate every text and icon colour against its real background when the token is created, not at audit.
• Targets: 44×44pt minimum for anything tappable, checked on the busiest screen in the product.
• Focus order: number the tab sequence on the design itself so implementation cannot invent one.
• Text scaling: view every layout at 200% type. Fixed-height containers break first, and they break loudly.
• Motion: any animation that moves across the screen needs a reduced-motion alternative specified alongside it.

It is not a separate audience

Larger tap targets help everyone on a moving train. Higher contrast helps everyone in direct sunlight. Clear focus states help everyone who prefers a keyboard. Designing for the edges of ability is how you make the middle comfortable — the accessibility case and the usability case are the same case.