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Re: tooltips on tap

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From: Tim Harshbarger
Date: Nov 11, 2021 7:08AM

I am sure someone else will correct me if I miss something.

Any user interface element that relies on focus or hover to work will not work on touch devices. So the only way tooltips will work on a mobile device is if you use some method for triggering the tooltip that does not rely on those events.

I wasn't able to spend as much as I would like to read the article. It is a good article, but I think it is just focused on desktop. It didn't look like any of the techniques I read would work on mobile because it looks like they all relied on focus or hover.

I hope that helps?
Thanks!
Tim
Tim Harshbarger
Senior Accessibility Consultant
Deque Systems

-----Original Message-----
From: WebAIM-Forum < <EMAIL REMOVED> > On Behalf Of Sonja Weckenmann
Sent: Saturday, November 6, 2021 10:54 AM
To: WebAIM Discussion List < <EMAIL REMOVED> >
Subject: [WebAIM] tooltips on tap

Hi,

I'm a little confused about whether or not custom tooltips can work for touch screen users (even knowing that tooltips are not recommended and knowing there is no problem with "toggletips").

I've read different statements:

- They are inaccessible to touch devices when attached to buttons or links. This is because hover is unavailable on a touch device, and it is also impossible to focus a button or link without activating it.
- Tooltips in general are a bit quirky on touch devices, since there's no "hovering".
- So far it simply doesn't work so well for touch screen users because the focus and active states happen simultaneously. In practice, this means you'll see the tooltip, but only as the button is being pressed.

I've seen examples from Scott O'Hara, displaying the tooltips on tap, so it seems to me that it is possible (http://scottaohara.github.io/a11y_tooltips/).

Could anyone explain this to me in a little more detail? Unfortunately I am not so much a kind of a JavaScript expert.

Thanks a lot.
Sonja