Accessibility: Preparing Images and Galleries

Visitors who have visual impairments may use assistive technology such as screen readers to browse your post. Add descriptions to your images and galleries using alt text to make them accessible to these visitors.

Alt text provides information about your media and helps search engines and screen readers "read" them.

Adding alt text

You should add alt text to all relevant images, including media appearing in functionalities such as Forum, Weblog, Groups etc.

Adding alt text ensures that visitors using screen readers can access and understand the content on your post. Learn more 

Text in images

This refers to images that contain pictured or added text.

Text in images cannot be "read" by search engines or screen readers. However, if the image is necessary, and the text has context to the post, you can add it to the image description using alt text.

If the text does not have context or doesn't contribute to the content of the post, you do not need to add it to the image description using alt text.

Select an option below to learn more about image text you should and shouldn't add to the image description using alt text.

• Important text Relevant text is text in images that are important to the context of the site, and contribute to the content.

• Non-important text Examples of text in images that may not be relevant include watermarks, or text that is added or pictured for decorative purposes.

Images of text

Images of text contain only text, and no other pictured elements. Some examples of this include pictures of fonts, or logos that contain text only.

As they are not "real" text elements, images of text cannot be read by search engines or screen readers. We recommend avoiding them where possible, and replacing them with real text elements to improve SEO and accessibility on your post.