WCAG 2.2: The Web Content Accessibility Guidelines

The Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) are the international benchmark for digital accessibility, and WCAG 2.2 is the current version. Almost every accessibility law in the world — the ADA in the US, the European Accessibility Act, the UK and Canadian public-sector rules, and more — is built on top of WCAG. This page explains what WCAG 2.2 is, the conformance levels, what changed from 2.1, how it connects to the law, and how to meet it.

What is WCAG 2.2?

WCAG is developed by the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C). WCAG 2.2 was published as a formal W3C Recommendation on 5 October 2023 and was adopted as the international standard ISO/IEC 40500 in 2025. It builds on WCAG 2.1 and 2.0 without replacing them: every existing success criterion is preserved, so content that meets WCAG 2.2 also meets the earlier versions. The guidelines apply not only to websites but to web applications, mobile apps, and digital documents.

The four principles (POUR)

All WCAG success criteria are organised under four principles. Accessible content must be:

• Perceivable — information and interface elements must be presentable in ways users can perceive (for example, text alternatives for images and captions for video).
• Operable — all functionality must work with a keyboard and assistive technologies, not just a mouse.
• Understandable — content and navigation must be clear, readable, and predictable.
• Robust — content must work reliably across browsers, devices, and assistive tools, now and as technology evolves.

Conformance levels: A, AA, AAA

WCAG defines three levels of conformance. Level A covers the most basic requirements; Level AA adds the criteria needed for a genuinely usable experience; and Level AAA is the most stringent and is not expected for entire sites. In practice, Level AA is the target, because that is the level referenced by the ADA case-law standard, the EAA (through EN 301 549), and public-sector regulations in the UK, Canada, and elsewhere.

What is new in WCAG 2.2

WCAG 2.2 adds nine new success criteria (and retires the obsolete "Parsing" criterion). They focus on keyboard focus visibility, motor accessibility, cognitive load, and authentication. Six of the nine apply at Level A or AA — the levels that matter for compliance.

How WCAG maps to the law

WCAG is a technical standard, not legislation — but it is the standard the legislation depends on:

• United States — ADA: WCAG 2.1 AA is the de facto standard courts apply to business websites; targeting WCAG 2.2 AA is the safer choice.
• European Union — EAA: conformity is presumed via EN 301 549, which incorporates WCAG (Level AA, moving toward 2.2).
• United States — Section 508: federal agencies follow WCAG Level AA for ICT.
• United Kingdom — public sector: the 2018 regulations require WCAG 2.2 AA.
• Canada — Accessible Canada Act: CAN/ASC-EN 301 549 incorporates WCAG Level AA.

Because all of these converge on WCAG Level AA, meeting WCAG 2.2 AA once generally satisfies requirements across multiple jurisdictions.

How to conform

1. Audit your sites, apps, and documents against WCAG 2.2 AA.
2. Remediate at the code level, since real conformance comes from fixing the underlying markup and behaviour.
3. Test with people and assistive technology — automated tools reliably catch only a portion of issues; the rest need expert manual review.
4. Cover documents and mobile apps, not just web pages.
5. Monitor continuously so new content does not break conformance.
6. Document conformance in an accessibility statement and keep records.

How Corpowid helps

Corpowid is an end-to-end digital accessibility and compliance partner — not a standalone overlay. We combine AI automation with expert human remediation to bring your websites, mobile apps, and documents to WCAG 2.2 AA, then keep them there with continuous monitoring and audit-ready reporting that documents your conformance as clear proof of effort.

Check your WCAG 2.2 conformance →