The Marathon to LearnDash’s Accessibility Conformance Report

 Explain the Meta Data

This artifact covers the end-to-end work that went into shipping LearnDash’s first Accessibility Conformance Report during the 4.20.2–4.25.4 release range.

Process: Working closely with Equalize Digital, LearnDash slogged through months of accessibility work to receive a final Accessibility Conformance report from Equalize Digital ahead of the EU deadlines.

Goal: Publish an honest, accurate report before enforcement deadlines hit and give customers the clarity they needed to meet their own compliance requirements.

Impact: LearnDash became the first StellarWP brand to ship an ACR and the first WordPress LMS plugin to publish its conformance level publicly. Customers gained clear guidance on what was accessible, what wasn’t, and what to account for when customizing their sites

The Challenge: Beat the Deadline

Shipping LearnDash’s first Accessibility Conformance Report wasn’t a sprint. It was a long stretch of work happening under real pressure: the EU accessibility enforcement timeline was closing in, and customers were asking where our accessibility statement was. They needed to meet their own legal requirements, and they couldn’t do that without knowing exactly where LearnDash stood.

Conformance, Not Compliance

LearnDash can’t claim full compliance because it lives inside a distributed ecosystem. Customers can customize anything they want. Their theme, plugins, and custom code all influence accessibility. In that kind of environment, the only honest and responsible approach is to publish our conformance level: what the core LearnDash product supports out of the box, what it doesn’t, and the areas customers need to be mindful of when they modify their sites.

And because LearnDash is an LMS, accessibility isn’t optional. Higher education, corporate training, and government environments often have stricter standards. Accessibility had to become a core part of LearnDash’s product strategy, not a side project or a compliance checkbox.

Working Hand-in-Hand with Equalize Digital

To ensure accuracy and transparency, we partnered closely with Equalize Digital. The workflow looked like this:

1. They delivered a full audit in spreadsheet form.
2. I organized the findings by product area so our release notes and communications would tell a clear story.
3. Engineering and I planned the work across sprints to make the timeline achievable.
4. As we progressed, Equalize Digital guided us through tougher accessibility challenges and best practices.
5. When all work was completed, they produced the official Accessibility Conformance Report.
   → Go to the report

Taking it to Market

Once the final report was ready, I wrote LearnDash’s Accessibility Statement to accompany it. This clarified what the report is, how to use it, and why it doesn’t represent 100% accessibility. We published it alongside the report and used it in marketing and presales conversations.
→ Read the Accessibility Statement

During this period, I coordinated closely with marketing, support, and customer success to prepare customers for the frontend changes. Accessibility work often touches markup, layout, and behavior, which meant certain customizations would break. We made sure people knew what to expect and how to update safely.

Results

LearnDash became the first brand at StellarWP to publish a software accessibility conformance report, and the first WordPress LMS plugin to do so. Customers wrote in to thank us. Some explicitly said they purchased LearnDash because this work demonstrated our commitment to accessibility.

We didn’t achieve 100% conformance. Two areas remained out of scope for that timeline:

• The matrix sorting quiz question type
• The PDF Certificate Builder

Both have workarounds, and both were planned for deeper refactors in the next cycle of product improvements. Those refactors were scheduled for 2026 but are tabled for now due to the organizational changes above us.

What We Delivered (Versions 4.20.2–4.25.4)

Across this range, we completed 77 accessibility-related improvements, each tied to a LearnDash release and grouped by feature area. These changes weren’t about chasing numbers; they were about making the platform genuinely usable for learners relying on assistive technology.

Quizzes & Assessments

Improved table structures, input labels, result announcements, and wrapping fixes.
→ Result: easier to read and navigate with assistive tech.

Forms & Registration

Correct field labels, error announcements, and safer button behaviors.
→ Result: fewer unexpected actions and clearer guidance for screen readers.

Alerts, Tooltips & Landmarks

Appropriate ARIA roles, consistently announced alerts, and improved landmark structure.
→ Result: users reliably understand state changes and page context.

Color & Focus States

Contrast improvements and clear focus indicators across tabs, themes, and buttons.
→ Result: better for low-vision and keyboard-only users.

Tables & Layouts

Avoided overflow, wrapping issues, and horizontal scrolling.
→ Result: more legible layouts on magnified screens and smaller devices.

Authoring Guidance

Backend warnings that flag inaccessible patterns (like specific matrix-sort issues).
→ Result: helps creators avoid pitfalls before publishing.

alert: this site has not been 100% updated for accessibility yet!