WebAIM - Web Accessibility In Mind

E-mail List Archives

Re: What about semi-bold?

for

From: Aditya
Date: Feb 14, 2019 6:27PM

I agree with the interpretation. Ask designers to choose colors that meet 4.5:1. If that's not possible, and if you really want to go by strict rules, enforce "bold = 700" rule. Depending on the font it might look hideous and a different color that meets 4.5 ratio might be given to you :)

Sent from my iPhone

> On Feb 14, 2019, at 5:10 PM, Patrick H. Lauke < <EMAIL REMOVED> > wrote:
>
>> On 14/02/2019 22:39, Jared Smith wrote:
>> WCAG doesn't address this. They simply set the "large text" threshold
>> with "bold" text - generally defined as 700 weight in CSS. Of course
>> different font faces will have different weights and boldness when
>> bold, so common sense is in order.
>
> I'll echo Jared's comment here...WCAG is surprisingly vague in this regard. Even just taking "bold" to mean 700 weight, this is mostly irrelevant as it does not take into account the actual typeface - even when set to "bold", some typefaces can be extremely thin. So it's a very handwavy requirement overall...
>
>> I would suggest that if text has less than 4.5:1 contrast and the only
>> thing that would allow it to pass WCAG is for it to be made bold and
>> thus "large text", that it probably has pretty low contrast
>> regardless.
>
> And I'd agree here as well. In an audit situation, I would say that text that is subjectively "bold-looking enough" may nominally pass the SC, but would still strongly advise clients not to rely on this and just aim for 4.5:1 regardless.
>
> P
> --
> Patrick H. Lauke
>
> www.splintered.co.uk | https://github.com/patrickhlauke
> http://flickr.com/photos/redux/ | http://redux.deviantart.com
> twitter: @patrick_h_lauke | skype: patrick_h_lauke
> > > >