For businesses selling digital products and services across the EU, this policy update represents a legal and strategic imperative. The clock is running out, and the cost of inaction is about to become tangible.
The good news is that you still have time. Here's the AccessPoint guide on preparing over the next month.
Policy and practical impact
The EAA is designed to harmonise accessibility standards across the EU. From June 28, 2025, all consumer-facing digital products, including websites, mobile apps, e-commerce platforms, self-service terminals, and ebooks, must meet stringent accessibility criteria. This will dramatically increase functionality for users with visual, auditory, cognitive, and motor impairments.
If your digital assets aren’t accessible with a WCAG 2.1 AA standard, they’re non-compliant. This means immediate legal exposure, and an imminent loss of access to European markets.
Accessibility: A competitive differentiator
Companies that prioritised accessibility early are already reaping the benefits. Accessible design enhances usability for all users, improves SEO performance, and broadens market reach. Accessibility is increasingly a foundation for sustainable digital growth.
Retrofitting inaccessible platforms under time pressure leads to compromised solutions. Accessibility isn’t just about adding alt text or using high-contrast colours. It requires structured code, semantic HTML, keyboard navigation, screen reader compatibility, and logical content hierarchies. This is why AccessPoint advocates for a measured, thorough approach to accessibility remediations. In the long run this will cost less, work better, and provide a more complete user experience.
Your checklist for the June 28th deadline
For those still scrambling to meet the deadline, focus on what matters most:
- Audit and triage: Conduct an initial audit of your main digital platforms. Identify critical blockers to accessibility, then triage based on user impact and technical complexity. Even some small improvements can make a dramatic difference.
- Prioritise high-traffic interfaces: Prioritise pages and workflows that affect the most users, especially purchase flows, login portals, and support sections.
- Fix, then future-proof: Immediate fixes will be vital, but accessibility should also become an ongoing practice. By learning more about digital accessibility you can build inclusive design into your design process and minimise future remediations.
Risk, regulation, and real opportunity
From June onward, each EU member state will begin enforcement through their own national agencies. This means fines, takedown notices, or blocked services depending on jurisdiction. But compliance isn’t just about risk mitigation. It’s also an opportunity to lead.
Companies that go beyond minimum requirements will build better products, create loyal customer bases, and demonstrate a genuine commitment to inclusion. As inclusive design becomes the standard, those who invest now will quickly outpace their competition.
The final month
Accessibility is now a legal necessity, a user demand, and a marker of modern digital maturity.
AccessPoint help businesses meet regulatory requirements, but more importantly, we are willing to meet them where they are, and provide improvements at every existing level of inclusion.
If you haven’t started, it's not too late to get in touch.