Level A · WCAG 2.0
1.3.1 Info and Relationships
The structure a sighted person sees — headings, lists, tables, groups of form fields — has to exist in the markup, not only in the styling.
Partly automated Some failures are detectable, others need judgement.
How it fails in practice
A bold paragraph used as a section heading. A layout table with no header cells. Radio buttons for delivery options with no fieldset, so a screen reader reads four unrelated choices.
How to fix it
Use the element that means the thing: h2 for a heading, ul for a list, th with a scope for a data table, fieldset and legend for a group.
At a glance
- Level
- Level A — the minimum. Failing one of these usually makes something impossible rather than merely hard.
- Principle
- Perceivable
- Guideline
- 1.3 Adaptable
- Added in
- WCAG 2.0
- EN 301 549
- 9.1.3.1
- Automated check
- Partly automated
Partly automated
How far an automated check gets
A tool finds some failures here and cannot see the rest. A clean automated result means the checks that exist found nothing — not that the criterion is met. This is the gap that makes a green scan look like an accessible site, and it is where our agents and a human reviewer do the remaining work.
Missing table headers, a heading level skipped and an unlabelled group are all found automatically. Whether the markup matches what the page looks like grouped is not — that part still needs eyes.
Related criteria
Other criteria under the same guideline.
Find out which criteria your site fails
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