Accessibility

WhimSale aims at WCAG 2.2 Level AA. This page says what we have actually done, and more usefully, what we know we have not.

What is in place

• State is never color alone. Sold, reserved, taken, open, selected and error states all carry a word or a mark as well as a color. A sold item says “Sold”; a full pickup slot says “Taken”.
• Text contrast is measured, not eyeballed. Body and secondary text were checked against their actual backgrounds, including where translucent panels sit over photographs, which is where contrast usually fails quietly.
• A skip link is the first thing a keyboard reaches on every page, and every page has a single main landmark.
• Visible focus. Keyboard focus draws a real outline, offset from the control so it is not swallowed by the border.
• Touch targets are at least 44 pixels for anything you tap outdoors. Checklist checkmarks are 28 pixels of checkbox inside a much larger row.
• Motion is optional. Everything that animates is disabled under prefers-reduced-motion.
• The map is not the only way to find anything. It is hidden from screen readers on purpose, because a canvas of pins is not navigable. The sale list beside it carries the same information as text and is the supported route. If the map fails to load, the page still works.
• The label sheet prints. Sellers who would rather work from paper than a phone screen can.

What we know is not right yet

Listing these rather than omitting them, because an accessibility statement that only describes successes is marketing.

• No screen reader testing by a real user. Structure and labels were built carefully and checked in markup, but nobody has driven this with VoiceOver, NVDA or JAWS. That is the largest gap on this page.
• No independent audit. Everything above was checked by the people who wrote it.
• The map itself is not keyboard-operable. Panning and zooming need a pointer. The list is the equivalent, but that is a workaround rather than parity.
• Alternative text for photographs is written by an AI, not by the seller and not by a person who can see the object. It describes what is visible and is usually good; it will sometimes be wrong in ways nobody catches, because the person best placed to notice is the one who cannot see the picture. Tell us when it is.
• Not tested at 200% zoom or 400% reflow in any systematic way.

Telling us it is wrong

Email hello@whimsale.com with the page and what happened. You do not need to know the standard or use the right words. “I could not tell which button was selected” is a perfectly good bug report, and more useful than a citation.

If something here blocks you from buying or selling, say so and we will also just do it for you in the meantime, by hand, while we fix it.