Accessibility issues
One of our clients is performing accessibility QC on a Storyline SCORM package using an automated accessibility testing tool. While the client has not explicitly mentioned the tool name, based on the type of issues reported, it appears that a tool such as axe DevTools may have been used. As per my understanding, tools like axe are primarily designed for evaluating custom HTML websites where developers have direct control over HTML structure and ARIA attributes. However, this course has been developed using Articulate Storyline, which automatically generates the HTML and ARIA markup through its player framework. Given these authoring tool constraints, we are unsure how to address certain reported issues that require direct HTML or ARIA-level changes. Has anyone encountered a similar situation, and could you please share how such accessibility findings are typically handled or communicated when working with Storyline-generated content? Also, attaching the list of issues that we received.Storyline Accessibility Issue
Hello all, I am currently building out a course that will have 5 different SCORM files. In files 1-3 the focus order is automatically displaying the course title. Note: The course title refers to the 'Player Feature: Title' that appears at the top of the screen near the menu when participants are accessing the course. File 4 is being very weird and is not displaying the course title at all except for one slide and it displays the wrong course title. The title is set correctly in the player, I have gone into the slide master and am unable to find and turn on/off the slide master title accessibility. In the focus order screen I am unable to delete it or type in alt text. Question 1: how do I turn off the course title in the focus reader while still displaying the title at the top of the screen? Question 2: If I can't do the above, how do I turn on the title so it is also included in the focus order for lesson 4 and is the correct title? Below is what the focus order looks like for file 1-3 with the 'Slide Master - Title' included Below is the focus order with the incorrect Slide Master - Title, it should read "Social Media" instead of "Environmental Scan". Below is the focus order with the missing 'Slide Master - Title' from the 4th fileElevate Your E-Learning by Prioritizing Accessibility and Usability
As an e-learning developer, you want to create content that engages learners and delivers on the learning objectives you worked hard to define. But what if that engagement and learning can't happen because of issues with accessibility or usability? In this article, you'll find out what accessibility and usability are and how you can apply the principles behind them to design courses that work better for all learners. Then, you'll get tips on reviewing and testing your courses to ensure they meet those standards. Let's get started! Understanding Accessibility Accessibility—also known as a11y—is the practice of making experiences work for everyone, regardless of their ability. In e-learning, accessible content means it's been designed for all learners to access—including those with auditory, visual, mobility, cognitive, or other disabilities. For example, using sufficient color contrast helps learners with low vision or color vision deficiency. Offering textual explanations for visual content is another common accessibility best practice. Focusing on web accessibility allows everyone to perceive, navigate, and interact with content. Guidelines—such as Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG)—and laws—like Section 508 (United States)—provide guidance and ensure all learners can access online materials equally. Understanding Usability Usability in e-learning measures how easy content is to use and examines how users experience it. Content should be user-friendly, intuitive, efficient, and effective. For example, if learners must complete a quiz, they should be able to test their knowledge without encountering confusing errors or getting stuck and feeling frustrated with the process. The Nielsen Norman Group is a firm focused on improving the everyday experience of using technology. They've defined five key components of usability that can also be applied when creating e-learning courses: Learnability. Accomplishing basic tasks should be easy, even the first time a learner encounters a course. Efficiency. Barriers that prevent learners from completing courses efficiently should be removed. Memorability. Learners who revisit content shouldn't have to start from scratch. Errors. Encountering errors—and recovering from them—shouldn't derail learning. Satisfaction. Engaging with the content should be enjoyable and pleasant for learners. Benefits of Combining Accessibility and Usability Accessible content enhances everyone's experience. For example, closed captions and transcripts for accessibility not only help learners who are deaf or hard of hearing. They also allow those in a loud environment where audio can't be heard or in a public space that requires silence to access content. Captions and transcripts improve understanding for foreign-language learners as well. However, ensuring that your e-learning content conforms to accessibility guidelines like captioning and transcripts doesn't mean your course automatically provides a usable learning experience for all. Conversely, while usability centers user experiences, usable content isn't necessarily accessible to people with disabilities. For example, a visually stunning course might be engaging for some learners. However, if it uses colors and other visuals alone to convey information or move the learner through, the content won't be accessible to those with low vision or color vision deficiency. To ensure truly equal access to digital content, apply accessibility and usability practices in tandem during the course development process. Testing for Accessibility and Usability The best way to find out if the content you're creating is accessible and usable is to test it. If you're new to this process, you might feel intimidated. But don't worry! We'll introduce you to some trusted accessibility testing tools and give you tips for usability testing to get you started in the next section. Accessibility Testing Accessibility testing can be done with automated tools or manually—both of which have advantages and disadvantages. For the most optimal results, combine both types of accessibility testing. Automated Testing Automated accessibility testing tools scan content for accessibility issues. They're easy to run and don't require in-depth accessibility knowledge to detect minor problems. Examples of automated accessibility testing tools include: Deque axe DevTools® WebAIM WAVE® TPGi ARC Toolkit ANDI (Accessible Name & Description Inspector) While automated accessibility testing tools boost speed and efficiency, they don't catch all accessibility issues. They also sometimes report false positives or misunderstand accessibility requirements. Additionally, your results might vary depending on the testing tool. Manual Testing Given the limitations described above, automated testing can be a practical place to start but usually won't finish the job. Manually reviewing your published course one slide at a time offers the most complete results. If that sounds overwhelming, don't panic. We've got you covered! Here's a checklist of universal design basics for text, multimedia, images, and interactivity elements in e-learning: Accessible E-Learning Checklist. Examples include: Check the accuracy of automated tests. Ensure learners can easily navigate content—such as hyperlinks, alternative text (alt text), menus, and closed captions—with a keyboard and screen reader. Make sure your course has plain and inclusive language appropriate for your audience and provides accessibility instructions wherever user input is required. While manual testing requires you to learn about accessibility requirements and standards, it's the best way to ensure everyone can access your content. Here are multiple resources to support you on your accessibility learning journey: Articulate 360 Accessibility Index of Support Articles Storyline 360: How to Design an Accessible Course Rise 360: How to Design an Accessible Course How To Test Your E-Learning Course with a Screen Reader My Course Isn’t Accessible! Now What? Usability Testing Usability testing is conducted by real people who scan content for usability problems. You can improve your usability testing and boost accessibility at the same time by including people with disabilities and those who use assistive devices and technology when you recruit and engage usability test participants. For example, organizations like Fable connect digital teams with people with disabilities to do usability testing. Wrap-Up We hope this article inspires you to provide accessible and usable e-learning experiences for all learners. What did you find most interesting? Is there anything we missed? Let's discuss! Share your thoughts in the comments below. For more help creating accessible courses, check out these helpful resources: All About Accessibility Articulate 360 Training Videos About AccessibilityFeature Request - Enable Screen Reader Support During Preview (by default)
Yesterday, I stumbled across the "Enable screen reader support during preview" feature that was tucked away in the Storyline Options window. Is there a reason why this option isn't checked by default? Apparently, this feature has been around for at least two years (probably longer), but I didn't know it existed and was publishing a new version of the course every time I needed to check something. I attended the webinar on the Beginner's Guide to NVDA and Storyline for Accessibility Testing and this option wasn't mentioned, so I imagine that a lot of other IDs and e-learning developers who care about accessibility are unaware of it as well. I see that the "Use Upgraded Text for new projects" was automatically enabled for me in that same window and was curious about why screen readers weren't given the same treatment as it wouldn't impact users who don't have one installed and anyone who has one can cut it off when they don't want to be in speech mode. If it can't be checked by default, is there a reason why it can't be added to the preview toolbar as well?Localization Closed Captions not appearing on Layers - HELP!
I have a file created in English and translated to French using the localization feature. Due to timeline management, some slides have layers for french vs english. When published, the CCs for only the SECOND layer in the order of layers shows up. So if English is selected as the language, English CC shows. If French is selected, French CC does NOT show. But on this slide below, only the English CCs show upStoryline's 2025 Year In Review
🎉 Wrapping up 2025 with a grateful (and honestly pretty tired) smile. It’s been a big year for Storyline 360, so I wanted to share a few highlights before we close the book. This year was about making Storyline more helpful in very real, practical ways, not just adding shiny features for the sake of it. A few things I’m especially proud of: 🚀 AI started pulling its weight This wasn’t about slapping a chatbot into the product. We focused on tangible wins that save time and reduce friction. Things like high-quality text-to-speech, automatic captions for audio and video, AI-generated alt text, image generation, and even quiz question generation. These are the kinds of tasks that used to slow authors down but should now feel easy or even trivial. We also introduced AI-generated JavaScript entrance animations, which might look like a small feature on the surface, but it’s actually a big deal for the future of AI in Storyline. We reworked how the AI Assistant chat works and laid the foundation for a whole new wave of AI-powered features. In 2026, we’re excited to keep pushing this further, helping you create objects and triggers, sync things on the timeline, and design better, more interactive courses without needing to be a power user on day one. ♿ Accessibility made meaningful progress The new Accessibility Checker, better screen reader support, Set Focus triggers, and captioning improvements were all driven directly by customer feedback. There’s still more to do, but this year delivered real improvements that authors and learners can feel. 🎨 More expressive interactivity and design tools Fluid morph transitions, new emphasis animations, shape merging, and a new JavaScript API opened up a lot of creative space. Courses don’t have to feel static anymore, and we’re seeing authors do some really impressive things with these tools. 🎥 Media just works better now We made some investments in media support this year for cleaner caption workflows, better playback reliability, and fewer weird edge cases. We also snuck in support for WebM, which enables videos with transparent backgrounds and unlocks some really fun design possibilities. A lot of unglamorous work here, but it makes a big difference day to day. 🛠️ A mountain of fixes and polish Hundreds of quality-of-life improvements landed this year. Some tiny, some massive, all aimed at making the authoring experience smoother and more predictable. None of this happens without customers pushing us, questioning us, and telling us when something feels off. That feedback keeps us honest, so please keep it coming. If you’ve used any of these features, I’d genuinely love to hear what’s working for you and what still feels rough. Tell me straight. What helped the most this year, and where did we miss? Here’s to an even better 2026!Problem with the screen recording in Articulate. HELP!
Hi everybody. Ok, there is a big problem which I am facing. 😬 Screen recording I have. Screen recording as simulation was done by me by selecting an 'x' size of screen size, which is never a trouble maker. Now I put that same recording as simulation where slide by slide test mode was selected by me. Now my smart colleague chose to change the screen size to 720x540. I had kept it 960x540 earlier. Now she wants me to simply copy and paste the slide as shown in below screenshots for ref. I 'simply' copy it and by doing ctrl+v I could duplicate the slide.😒 (Note: this is happening for any slide that I try to duplicate). As shown below in the SS, the recording size or ratio gets distorted and goes out of the slide size or canvas. Since its a recording, I get no option to fix this by adjusting the edges of it like how we increase or decrease the picture or image size. It 'simply' doesn't allow me to have a clean duplicate file or slide of the ones created. Therefore, I seek for help from anyone who could do some miracle. Else, I have to redo everything or to think about some something else. Because these things aren't in my control. Watch the SS attached carefully. Thanks. 😇In Case You Missed It (ICYMI): Accessibility Updates in Q4 2025
Welcome to our Q4 2025 update! This quarter, we focused on making accessibility easier to create and better to experience. Across Rise and Storyline, we introduced new AI-powered tools for captions, alt text, and narration, expanded options for accessible design, and fixed issues that affected keyboard and screen reader users. Together, these updates help authors save time while building learning experiences that work well for people using a wide range of assistive technologies. We're excited to see our community grow. This quarter, 71 new members joined, bringing us to 824 people who care about accessibility and inclusion. We're happy you're here with us. Let's take a look at what's new this quarter! Product Updates Rise New: Boost your video's accessibility with AI-generated captions you can easily fine-tune using an intuitive built-in editor. New: Add audio to scenario blocks for content that's even more interactive content. Enhanced: Use the Bullet Style options in the text formatting toolbar to modify the size and color of bullets and numbers in lists. Enhanced: Modify the spacing between buttons with this convenient button stack setting. Storyline New (Beta): Easily translate text-to-speech audio and AI-generated narrations with Articulate Localization to make your content more inclusive. Enhanced: Automatically generate alt text for your assets all at once, then edit or finalize each description right from the accessibility checker. Enhanced: Save time and boost accessibility by automatically generating AI captions for uncaptioned audio and video files when you import a Storyline 360 project. Enhanced: Streamline your captioning process with AI Assistant. Generate captions automatically when you import media with flexible settings to fit your workflow. Enhanced: Quickly improve accessibility by generating captions for course audio and video content in one step. Enhanced: Maximize efficiency while ensuring accessibility by generating captions after recording audio in Storyline 360. Enhanced: You can now add alt text to your cover photos to improve accessibility. Enhanced: Improve caption readability on any background by turning text shadow on or off. Enhanced: You can now chat with AI Assistant to generate text-to-speech narration from your slide notes in addition to your slide content or script. Fixed: Marker title text disappeared when turning accessible text off. Fixed: The accessibility checker incorrectly reported missing text styles on slide master layouts even when they were already applied. Fixed: Textboxes displayed scrollbars that couldn't be accessed with the keyboard when users enabled a text-spacing browser extension in Google Chrome. Fixed: Keyboard navigation didn't work for web objects on layers, and screen readers didn't announce their alt text. Fixed: NVDA screen reader users could access disabled buttons through arrow-key navigation. Fixed: Screen readers inconsistently announced the slide title and state. Fixed: Windows Narrator added an unwanted description before the slide title. Fixed: The focus indicator didn't work correctly for hyperlinks and images with zoom enabled. Fixed: A scrollbar didn't appear as expected when text overflowed. Fixed: The text for the keyboard shortcuts toggle didn't meet color contrast guidelines. Fixed: The focus indicator didn't highlight the volume control when users viewed videos in full-screen mode. Other Updates New Articles Accessibility Standards Around the World Updated Articles Storyline 360: Our Accessibility Journey Storyline 360: Navigation for Screen Reader and Keyboard-Only Users Storyline 360: How Screen Reader or Keyboard-only Navigation Works for Multiple Choice and Multiple Response Questions Rise 360 Accessibility Conformance Report Storyline 360: JavaScript Tips and Examples Rise 360: Create Custom Blocks Storyline 360: Tips for Importing Microsoft PowerPoint and Articulate Presenter Content Accessibility Index We also hosted accessibility stations at the Articuland Summit and DevLearn, where we had the chance to talk directly with many of you about accessibility. We shared our Accessibility Quick-Start Guide, a concise course designed to help you understand the basics of accessibility, apply best practices, and know where to go next. at DevLearn and LeslieMcKerchie at Articuland Summit We’d love to hear from you. What update caught your attention this quarter? Are you planning to join us at axe-con 2026? Let us know in the comments below.
