Designing an accessibility audit and monitoring platform that helps non-expert teams
understand issues, track progress, and take action toward compliance.
Project
Accesswave
Industry
Compliance
Duration
100 hours
Role
Concept, UX/UI, Research, Branding
Tools
Figma, FigJam, Maze, ChatGPT 4
Background
Teams responsible for accessibility compliance often understand the urgency of the problem, but not how to navigate it. The challenge was to design a platform that could translate complex standards like WCAG and the EU Accessibility Act into understandable workflows, meaningful reporting, and next actions for people without deep technical expertise.
Outcome
Accesswave is an application I designed to solve accessibility issues for digital products. The final concept created a clearer and more actionable accessibility workflow, especially around understanding issues, tracking progress, and deciding what to fix next. Testing suggested that the design direction improved navigation clarity and helped users work with dense information more confidently. This case study showcases my end-to-end process for crafting an accessible, modern solution.
Challenges
01
The platform had to support users with limited technical knowledge while still dealing with expert-level subject matter.
02
Automated accessibility tools can only solve part of the problem, so the product needed to support manual understanding and follow-through.
03
The UI was inherently text-heavy, which increased the risk of cognitive overload.
04
Users needed both legal clarity and practical guidance, not just raw issue detection.
05
Because accessibility work is ongoing, the product needed to support monitoring and workflow continuity, not only one-time audits.
Process
User research
Definition
Ideation
Prototyping & Testing
Final UI
My Role
UX/UI
Research
Concept
Visual Design
My work included:
User research and interview synthesis
Competitive analysis in the accessibility tooling space
Problem framing and feature prioritization
User flows, wireframes, and dashboard architecture
Usability testing across low-fi and hi-fi stages
Branding and interaction design for a text-heavy product
Key Decisions
1. Design for actionability, not just detection
What changed:
I prioritized guided checklists, issue descriptions, and fix recommendations instead of treating the audit as a static report.
Why:
Research showed that users were less blocked by knowing that issues existed than by not understanding what to do next.
Alternative considered:
A more scanner-driven experience focused mainly on automated audit output.
Tradeoff:
More guidance creates more interface density, but it makes the platform substantially more useful for non-experts.
2. Treat monitoring as a core workflow, not a secondary feature
What changed:
I designed the dashboard around progress visibility, score trends over time, and previous audits rather than only one-time scan results.
Why:
Interviewees consistently described accessibility as an ongoing responsibility that needs to fit into existing workflows.
Alternative considered:
Focusing the concept primarily on launching single audits.
Tradeoff:
Monitoring adds product complexity, but better reflects how organizations actually maintain compliance.
3. Use information hierarchy aggressively to reduce cognitive overload
What changed:
I structured the experience with tabs, accordions, sorting options, and clearer issue grouping so users could choose what to expand and what to ignore.
Why:
The platform had to present dense audit data without overwhelming users or making critical issues harder to find.
Alternative considered:
Showing more information upfront to maximize transparency.
Tradeoff:
Hiding some detail improves focus, but demands careful labeling so users remain oriented.
4. Keep the visual system intentionally quiet
What changed:
I built the brand around a restrained grey-based palette, minimal accents, subtle states, and typography choices that reinforced clarity rather than personality-first styling.
Why:
The product’s job was to help users process complex information, so the interface needed to feel calm, professional, and unobtrusive.
Alternative considered:
A more expressive or feature-heavy visual language.
Tradeoff:
Minimalism reduces noise, but requires stronger hierarchy and copy to keep the product from feeling flat or ambiguous.
5. Use testing to refine labels and navigation before scaling the system
What changed:
I iterated on main navigation, audit tabs, issue labels, and button placement based on Maze testing at both wireframe and UI stages.
Why:
In a dense workflow product, language and navigation patterns can materially affect comprehension and speed.
Alternative considered:
Freezing the IA earlier and focusing testing mainly on polish.
Tradeoff:
More iteration on structure takes time, but avoids scaling confusing patterns into the final concept.
Key takeaways
The foundation of valuable research is overcoming subjective bias and empathizing with the user
Effective research will lead to a deep understanding of the problem space
Effective research can lead to solutions which were not part of the initial idea
The most effective navigation patterns work across the whole platform and allow for multiple entry points and cross-navigation between different sections
Designing solutions which integrate well into an existing platform
The importance of constant feedback and evaluation
Next steps
Additional testing rounds to come up with diverse approaches for the display of information in the audit dashboards. Add more functions to filter, sort and mark the audit results to guarantee the best possible way of using the platform to reach compliance with current accessibility standards
I plan to conduct long-term user testing to measure adoption and impact.
Conduct A/B-testing
Integrating AI to automate report generation and expanding support for additional accessibility standards.
This project reinforced my commitment to designing for inclusivity and innovation.
Process documentation
Final UI overview
Competitive analysis and UX research synthesis
Venn diagram
User Personas
Information architecture
User flows
Dashboard hierarchy
Components & accessible focus states
