Adobe Acrobat DC has a built-in accessibility checker to help you make sure the PDFs you have created or get from others meet accessibility guidelines. While no automated checker will catch everything, this is a simple and convenient way to find and fix some of the most common issues with PDFs.
Once you have an accessible document set up in Word, it's time to make the PDF! While this seems simple enough, it's still important to do it the correct way, or the final PDF may lose all of that accessibility information.
If you're creating a document that needs to be distributed as a PDF, when it comes time to create the PDF, the first rule is very simple: do not use a 'Print to PDF' option!
PDFs often introduce barriers to assistive technology users. While it's certainly possible to create accessible PDFs, it's also worth considering whether the document you're working on really needs to be distributed as a PDF.
Many of the PDFs stored in our Canvas courses and sent around campus are fine for most readers but are partially or entirely inaccessible for someone using assistive technology. If you have PDFs that don’t pass accessibility checks, Accessible Technology is here to help!
