Images and graphics make content more pleasant and easier to understand for many people, in particular, those with cognitive and/or learning disabilities.
Images are important as they can serve as cues for people with visual impairments, including people with low vision, to orient themselves in the content.
Adding an image or a graphic to your content without using proper or empty alternative text, however, can be extremely frustrating for people with visual impairments navigating the nsw.gov.au site. Alternative text for images will add valuable information for low vision or blind screen reader users.
Writing Alternative (alt) text
Alt text (alternative text) is a textual description that can be added to images to provide context and accessibility to those who use screen readers or have other visual impairments.
Learn more about alt text for images
Consider Grammar
When using image alt text, it should not include:
- 'picture of'
- 'image of'
Screen readers automatically announce an image as an image. So an alternative text 'Image of an apple' would be read aloud by a screen reader as 'image, Image of an apple'. It's also important to use the correct grammar to help the screen reader understand the end of whole sentences or beginning of a new sentence. For example
- Capitalise the first letter
- End whole sentences with a period
Consider the context of the image
When writing alt text consider the context of the image and the additional supporting content.
The tone of voice of the accompanying content should inform the tone of voice for the alt text. While the alt text needs to describe the image as concisely as possible, consider if you can convey nuances, details, and emotions if they are relevant to the user experience.
For example, for the picture below the alt text could be: A family are walking out of house
Or using descriptive text we could say:
A man and women are leaving a house with smiles on their face as a young boy rides a red scooter in front of them.
Other visual content
Decorative images
Decorative images can add visual interest to a page but they do not serve a specific purpose and aren’t informative (for example, stylistic borders). When using these types of images, its best to leave the alt text empty.
Videos
When uploading videos to the nsw.gov.au CMS, ensure the video has closed captions and you have a transcript of the video. Transcripts are the text version of the speech or audio information in the video. They provide people with another way to process information in a text format.
Its’s best to copy and paste a transcript of the video into the transcript box when you first upload the video into the nsw.gov.au CMS. Alt text is not used for videos.
Best practice for images on nsw.gov.au
Read about using images on nsw.gov.au for guidelines and best practice.
More information on digital accessibility
To learn more about digital accessibility, visit the NSW Government Digital Accessibility and Inclusion Toolkit.
Need any more help?
If you have any questions, or require assistance with anything mentioned on this article, submit a request via the webform.