Home ― Accessibility at DSU ― Training Resources ― Guide to Accessible Documents ― Office Documents

Creating Accessible Office Documents

When creating content with Office, you can make it accessible to people with disabilities through some simple adjustments. You can use several built-in Office features to make sure that everybody can read and understand your documents. By increasing accessibility in your documents, you can cater to your whole audience, and not just a portion of it.

You can use Accessibility Checker to make sure that your content is truly accessible. The free tool is available in Word, Excel, Outlook, OneNote, and PowerPoint on Windows or Mac, and Visio on Windows. Accessibility Checker finds any accessibility issues in your document and explains why each might be a potential problem for someone with a disability. It also offers suggestions on how to resolve each issue.

The following table includes some best practices for creating Office documents that are accessible to people with disabilities. For detailed information on how to find and fix the problem in a specific Office application, see the applicable instructions: