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Accessibility in Illustrator

Learn how to use accessibility features in Illustrator and how to create accessible designs using Illustrator.

Accessibility of software involves features in it that help people with visual, auditory, speech, motor, cognitive, and mobile disabilities use it with less difficulty. By extension, it also involves the usability of assistive technologies like screen readers and screen magnifiers with the software.

Illustrator has some tools and functionalities that are accessibility-friendly. It also lets you create accessible designs.

Note:

Illustrator isn't accessibility-friendly for people with full vision loss. It does partially support people with limited vision. Learn more about screen readers.

Native accessibility- friendly features of Illustrator

Explore the native accessibility-friendly features in Illustrator.

Keyboard support

  • Some Illustrator functionalities, such as menu options, can be operated through a keyboard interface. However, most functions can only be performed using the mouse. 
  • Illustrator offers many keyboard shortcuts. When you press a keyboard shortcut, it not only invokes the tool but also announces the name of the tool (while you use VoiceOver Utility in macOS).
  • Keyboard shortcuts can be remapped and removed, but Illustrator requires a mouse or touch to do so. Go to Edit > Keyboard Shortcuts in the Illustrator workspace to remap keyboard shortcuts.
Note:

Users with limited manipulation cannot rely on a keyboard alone to interact with user interfaces. Though there are key combinations to perform certain functions, certain features cannot be accessed with the keyboard-only operation.

User interface customization

Brightness

You can change the brightness of the Illustrator user interface to Dark, Medium Dark, Medium Light, or Light. 

Go to Edit Preferences > User Interface. Select the appropriate brightness icon next to Brightness and select OK.

Large Tabs

You can change the size of document tabs.

Go to Edit Preferences > User Interface. Check Large Tabs and select OK.

Selection & Anchor display

You can increase the size of selection handles, anchor points, and bezier controls.

Go to Illustrator > Preferences > Selection & Anchor display and move the slider of Anchor points, Handle and Bounding Box Display to its max value.

UI Scaling

Screens with larger resolutions have an option for UI scaling. 

Go to Edit > Preferences User Interface. Move the slider next to UI Scaling to select the required scaling and select OK.

Appearance of Black

You can set the appearance of black as Rich Black on RGB and grayscale devices for on-screen or printing/exporting appearance. 

Go to Edit Preferences Appearance of Black. Choose Rich Black for On Screen or Printing/ Exporting and select OK.

Color contrast

Text

Most text meets minimum contrast requirements except when tools are highlighted, the light blue text on the light gray background lacks sufficient contrast.

Non-text elements

Most meaningful non-text content elements have sufficient contrast except in some functions, a control has a dark blue outline on a dark gray background.

Tip:

Illustrator does not fully support high contrast mode on Windows. Illustrator does not respond to high contrast mode except for title bars and menus.

Text resize

Illustrator allows operating system display scaling to resize text up to 200 percent without loss of content or functionality for most functions. Exceptions include:

  • The opening video that can have its controls disappear at that zoom level.

Wacom support

Illustrator supports Wacom tablets. To enable Wacom, go to Edit > Preferences > Devices, and check Enable Wacom.

Support for assistive technologies

Explore the usability of assistive technologies in Illustrator.

Screen readers

Most non-text elements in Illustrator don't have correct text alternatives for use by screen readers. For example, icons that visually indicate the state and status of tool options. To use the screen reader, ensure that you've enabled VoiceOver (macOS) and installed JAWS Client (Windows).

Follow these steps to enable the screen reader:

macOS

  1. Go to System preferences > Accessibility

  2. Select VoiceOver > Enable VoiceOver > Open VoiceOver Utility

  3. Go to Navigation and select Move VoiceOver cursor from the Mouse pointer dropdown.

  4. Start Illustrator and open the New Document window. The VoiceOver cursor will be able to focus on the elements and announce their names.

A screen showing  how to access accessibility tab and then apply VoiceOver utility in macOS
VoiceOver Utility in macOS

Tip:
  • When you press the keyboard shortcut to invoke the tool, the VoiceOver Utility announces the name of the tool.
  • It also announces the name of the artboard when you access it in the Presentation Mode (Shift + F).

Windows

  1. Launch JAWS

  2. Go to Utilities > Voice Assitant > Settings

  3. Scroll to the bottom and go to Mouse Echo and enable it.

  4. Start Illustrator and Create/ Open a New Document. JAWS will be able to announce the text associated with the hovered item.

JAWS in Windows
JAWS in Windows

The screen reader is supported on the following UI items:

  • Toolbar, status bar, properties panel, menu items, Dialog.
  • Panels are partially supported. 

Screen magnifiers

Illustrator works with screen magnifiers in general.

Create accessible content on Illustrator

You can create Color Blind Safe color themes for your design using Adobe Color. Once you create them, you can access them from Window > Libraries, or Window > Color Themes. To learn more, see Adobe Color | Accessibility tools.

To see how your design appears for people with Protanopia and Deuteranopia, go to View > Proof Setup and choose Color blindness - Protanopia-type and Color blindness - Deuteranopia-type respectively. You can adjust your design colors accordingly.

Tip:

Illustrator does not provide you an option to add text alternatives to non-text elements in PDF documents. Text alternatives can be added using Adobe Acrobat.

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