Situation
You're hard of hearing. You're watching a video with loud music, sound effects, and overlapping dialogue. Everything becomes confusing. It's difficult for you to follow conversations and understand information because there are no subtitles available.
Information
Digital accessibility also applies to audio and video content. Everyone, regardless of their disability, must be able to understand them.
Everything spoken must be read by deaf or hard-of-hearing people via subtitles, or seen through sign language. Blind or visually impaired people can use audio description, which details all the visual elements useful for understanding a sequence.
Media files must be accompanied by a text transcript placed nearby. This version is then available to anyone who prefers text.
The user should be able to control the playback of videos or podcasts present on a page.
Our recommendations
Consider subtitling your videos.
Make sure you have a proper text transcription for each content.
Avoid setting videos and audios to start automatically when a page opens.
Avoid overloading a video with sound or visual effects that can be distracting for hypersensitive people.
Explore more!
- Access42: How to make videos, podcasts and other audio content accessible on social networks ;
- Arcom: Disability and audiovisual and digital communication: 20 years of Arcom's actions in favor of accessibility.
Status
Sent to staff: May 26, 2025