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Creating Accessible Spreadsheets in Microsoft Excel

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Bad example of using empty cells to create white space.

Adding alternative text tags to images in Microsoft Powerpoint 2003 documents makes them accessible to screen-readers and users with disabilities.

  1. Do not use blank cells for formatting purposes, like in this example. It’s better to densely pack the data in the workbook and then use Excel’s native formatting techniques. Avoid the use of white space with lots of blank cells or blank rows and columns.

Table using header rows to create order.
  1. Create header rows to build a sense of order on the page and help people with disabilities navigate through the table.

Ineffective table that reads up and down.
  1. Make your table read from left to right, rather than up and down. In the given example, a disability user would read the table as name, John, Sarah, Stacy, Adam, Michael, Average, Class, TECH 121, Tech 221, etc. Make the headers on the top and a disability user would read Name, Class, Number Grade, Letter Grade, John, Tech 121, 95.3%, A, Sarah, etc.

Table with the Name column selected.
  1. Make regions in your spreadsheet so that users, with disabilities or not, can quickly jump from region to region in your spreadsheet by using Ctrl + G (F5). To create a region, select the cells that are included in the region.

Insert menu opened, Name menu selected, and Define clicked.
  1. Open the Insert menu.
  2. Click on Name.
  3. Select Define.

Close up of Define Name window.
  1. The Define Name dialog box opens. Type a name for the region and click OK.

Close up of Formula Bar when region selected.
  1. The name of the region will then be displayed in the Formula Bar when it is selected.

Information cell saying what to do with table.
  1. Be sure to make a cell with information about the table or instructions on how to navigate through it.