Impact and Risk
Accessibility Failures Are Measurable Business Risk
The issue demos in this lab are not edge cases. They map directly to user harm, lost revenue, legal exposure, and avoidable engineering churn.
Impact statistics
96.3%
Home pages with detectable WCAG failures
WebAIM Million findings show pervasive barriers across top websites.
1.3B
People globally living with disability
Accessibility quality affects a material portion of total users.
$13T
Estimated annual disability spending power
Exclusion directly translates to lost market opportunity.
4,605
US digital accessibility lawsuits in 2023
Compliance and legal risk continue to rise.
Where the Cost Lands
User Harm
- Essential flows become impossible for keyboard and screen reader users.
- Users are forced to abandon tasks and seek support channels.
- Trust declines when basic interactions fail repeatedly.
Business Cost
- Conversion drop from inaccessible checkout and registration flows.
- Support volume increases when users cannot self-serve.
- Remediation cost grows as debt compounds across releases.
Delivery Risk
- Late accessibility fixes disrupt sprint predictability.
- Legal escalations drive reactive engineering work.
- Brand credibility suffers when failures are publicly visible.
Source Reference
Use the primary references below when aligning priorities with design, product, and legal teams.
Next Step: Turn Impact Into Priority
Move from abstract compliance to concrete user risk. Walk your team through issue demos by severity, then convert each barrier into roadmap actions.