How is a website tested with a keyboard and a screen reader?

You put the mouse away and walk the key path on the site using only the keyboard: Tab, Shift+Tab, Enter, Space, arrow keys and Escape. Then you walk the same path by listening, through a free screen reader such as NVDA on Windows or the built-in VoiceOver on Mac. The two tests catch different things, which is why they are run together. The keyboard shows whether you can reach every element at all, and the screen reader shows how what you reached actually sounds. Automated scanning alone catches only part of the violations: in a test by the UK Government Digital Service, all the tools together found 71% of the barriers.

Published 24.09.2026. Checked 24.09.2026.

How do you run the keyboard-only test?

You set the mouse aside and move from the top of the page to the goal, an order or an enquiry, using only keys. Tab moves focus forward, and Shift+Tab moves it backward. Enter and Space activate a button or link. Arrow keys move within a dropdown menu or a set of tabs. Escape closes a dialog or popup. Throughout the walk you watch for four things: whether focus is clearly visible, with a visible outline or highlight, on every element you land on; whether the order Tab follows through the page matches the visual order rather than jumping around; whether focus ever gets "trapped," meaning you cannot leave an element with the keyboard; and whether every button, link or field is reachable at all, rather than skipped entirely.

Which screen reader should you choose?

Per WebAIM's latest survey (July-August 2026, 1,780 screen reader users), JAWS is the primary desktop screen reader for 55% of respondents, NVDA for 32.9%, and VoiceOver for 6.5%. On a phone, 72.2% of respondents use VoiceOver and 29.5% use TalkBack. For practical testing by a team without specialist accessibility skills, NVDA is a good starting point on Windows, because it is free, widely used in Europe per the same survey, and has a simple set of keys. VoiceOver ships built into every Mac, iPhone and iPad, with no installation needed.

How do you start NVDA and VoiceOver?

NVDA installs once from the project's website. It starts with Ctrl+Alt+N, if that shortcut was enabled during installation, and quits with NVDA+Q. To read the line the cursor is on, you use NVDA+Up Arrow; to keep reading forward, NVDA+Down Arrow. The H key jumps to the next heading on the page, Shift+H to the previous one, and F jumps to the next form field. VoiceOver on Mac turns on with Cmd+F5. The VO combination (by default Control+Option) plus the letter A reads forward from the current position, and VO+Cmd+H jumps to the next heading. The shortcut VO+U opens the "rotor," a list of every heading, link or field on the page, which you move through with arrow keys and Enter.

What should you listen for while the reader reads?

The goal is not just for the reader to speak, but to speak sense. You check whether headings describe exactly the section they introduce rather than sounding arbitrary. You check whether every form field has a clear label read together with the field, not somewhere else on the page. You check whether a link or button makes sense on its own, taken out of context, instead of you hearing only "click here". You also check whether an important change on the page, an error message after submitting a form for instance, is announced right away rather than staying silent until you move focus to it by hand.

Questions

Do we need to buy JAWS to run this test?

No. NVDA on Windows is free and enough for a first pass; VoiceOver ships built into Mac. JAWS is paid and used more often in professional testing, once you already know which specific barriers to check.

Is a keyboard-only test enough if we don't have time for a screen reader?

Not fully. The keyboard shows whether elements are reachable, but not how they sound to someone who cannot see the screen. A heading with no meaning, a field with no label, or a button announced only as "button" all pass the keyboard test but fail on listening.

How do you run the same test on a mobile phone, not just a desktop computer?

On an iPhone you turn on VoiceOver through Settings, Accessibility, Accessibility Shortcut, then switch it on and off with a triple-click of the side button. You move between items by swiping right or left. You activate the focused one with a double tap anywhere on the screen. You open the "rotor" menu of headings, links and landmarks by rotating two fingers like a dial. On Android the built-in reader is TalkBack, turned on the same way, through the phone's accessibility settings.

Sources

This test runs by hand, page by page.

A Digital Accessibility Review walks your key pages exactly this way, with a keyboard and a screen reader. It also shows in writing where focus gets lost and which element stays silent.

Ask about a Digital Accessibility Review

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