Add an Emoji to the End of Every Word
Emojis and Digital Accessibility (A11y)
Emojis have become a fun way to communicate. They are a great way to convey text and tone. The clapping-hands emoji in between each word has always been my favorite way to show exasperation.
The Problem
The problem is that emojis can make content difficult to parse when using assistive technology (AT) such as a screenreader. Most people who use screenreaders have reported some sort of disability (click here for an annual report on screenreader usage); it's important they aren't forgotten. Let's see how unedited emojis sound to a screenreader.
Emojis rendered properly
Frontend developers interested in a11y may have seen code examples that take advantage of the role and aria-label attributes available to an element, as well as the unicode for the emoji:
Remember, an accessible website might not be usable for people with disbilities. The word "image" will be appended to the end of your label. Unlike our eyes, ATs has no way of knowing which characters should be read and which our decorative, so it reads them all. It would still be difficult to read an entire sentence.
No emojis
Like all important information, it's best to remove emojis so that the substance of your text can be understood clearly to all readers.
Moderation is key
People both with and without disabilities use emojis as a fun form of communication. They're not going away, nor should they!
It's important that we as developers take on the burden of ensuring that our content is readable and meaningful to the entirety of its audience.
Maybe we can avoid all tweets like this in the future:
