Website performance is not just about user experience; it has a significant impact on accessibility as well. A slow-loading website can create barriers that prevent many users, particularly those with disabilities, from accessing content effectively.
Poor performance affects how quickly people can navigate, read, and interact with your site, which often leads to frustration and abandonment. Regular website monitoring can help identify and resolve these issues early.
In this blog post, we will look at why website speed matters for accessibility, how a slow website affects user experience, and practical strategies to improve performance so your content is faster, more inclusive, and easier to use for everyone.
Why is it important for a website not to be slow?
A slow website affects both users and businesses in significant ways. Long wait times increase frustration and reduce trust, as people expect pages to load quickly. Many visitors will leave before engaging with your content if performance lags. The impact is even greater for users with disabilities, who may rely on assistive technologies that often magnify delays.
Poor website speed can also reduce conversions, lower search engine rankings, and harm brand reputation. Search engines such as Google factor page load time into their algorithms, which means a slow website can make it harder for people to find your content in the first place. Investing in accessible web development helps address these issues at the source by improving both performance and inclusivity.
Improving website speed starts with understanding the challenges that slow websites create for users. The following sections explain how performance issues affect accessibility and outline practical strategies to make your site faster and more inclusive.
1. The Impact of Slow Websites on Accessibility
A slow website does more than frustrate users. Poor page load time can create real accessibility barriers, especially for people who rely on assistive technologies. When content takes too long to appear, users may struggle to interact with essential features, complete tasks, or even remain on the site. These challenges highlight why optimising performance is about more than speed alone; it is also about inclusivity. Expert remediation consulting can help address these accessibility challenges and remove barriers for users.
Slow websites present several barriers to users with disabilities:
- Increased load times: Users relying on assistive technologies may experience even longer delays due to the extra resources needed to support their tools. A delay can make it frustrating for users, leading to abandonment.
- Impaired interaction: When content takes too long to load, it can prevent keyboard or screen reader users from interacting with elements such as forms, links, or navigation menus. For instance, if a form is delayed in loading, users may not be able to submit important information in a timely manner.
- Fatigue and stress: Slow websites can cause sensory overload for users with cognitive impairments, as they have to wait longer for page elements to load. The frustration can lead to abandonment or difficulty in completing tasks.
For users with cognitive or motor disabilities, page load times are even more critical. Accessibility is not only about meeting the needs of users who are blind or visually impaired. It is about ensuring a seamless and stress-free experience for everyone.
What to do:
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Use minification tools to remove unnecessary spaces, comments, and code, making the files smaller and easier to load.
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Compress files using Gzip or Brotli to reduce the size even further.
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Keep your libraries up to date to ensure you’re using the latest, most efficient versions.
Reducing the size of these files will not only improve performance but also make it easier for assistive technologies to process the page faster, which is essential for screen readers, speech recognition software, and other tools.
2. Ensure CSS and JavaScript Are in External Files
Embedding CSS and JavaScript directly in the HTML can slow down a website, especially when there is a large amount of code. Each time a page loads, the browser is forced to download the CSS and JavaScript again, even if the files have not changed. This repeated loading adds unnecessary delays and reduces overall page load time.
What to do:
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Move all CSS and JavaScript into external files and reference them in your HTML. This allows browsers to cache the files, so users do not need to download them on every visit.
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Load CSS asynchronously to ensure it does not block the rendering of the page.
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Defer JavaScript loading until after the page has fully loaded, making the site more usable for people who rely on screen readers or other assistive technologies.
A thorough design system assessment can help identify inefficient coding patterns and ensure performance is built into every component.
3. Place JavaScript in the Footer to Avoid Render Blocking
When JavaScript is placed at the top of a page, it can block rendering. In practice, this means the content will not appear until the script has fully loaded. Users on slow connections or those relying on screen readers are especially affected, since they often must wait for all scripts to finish before they can interact with the page. Such delays reduce accessibility and harm overall website speed.
What to do:
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Move JavaScript to the footer of your site to prevent it from blocking the rendering of content. This allows users to begin interacting with the page while scripts continue to load.
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For critical scripts, use asynchronous loading so they do not delay the display of important information.
4. Ensure the HTML Contains No JavaScript
The core HTML structure of a page should not depend on JavaScript to display essential content. Over-reliance on scripts can create major barriers for users who disable JavaScript for security reasons or because their device does not support it.
When important elements such as text, navigation, or forms are hidden behind scripts, users may be unable to access them at all. This not only limits accessibility but can also hurt overall web speed by making pages slower and less efficient. Proper use of landmarks for screen reader users also ensures navigation remains clear and accessible without relying on JavaScript.
What to do:
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Keep critical content available directly in the HTML, including headers, body text, and navigation elements.
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Use JavaScript to enhance functionality and interactivity, but avoid making it the foundation of your site’s structure or accessibility.
5. Use data- Attributes in <script> Tags to Pass Dynamic Data
To improve page load speed and reduce render-blocking JavaScript, you can pass small bits of dynamic data using data-attributes on the <script> tag itself. Your external JavaScript file can then read these attributes at runtime without relying on inline JavaScript or additional HTTP requests. This approach keeps HTML lean, speeds up rendering, and contributes to better accessibility by making interactive features load faster and more predictably.
What to do:
Add data- attributes to a <script> tag that loads your external JavaScript file:
<script src=”/assets/js/app.js” data-username=”jdoe” data-role=”admin”></script>
Then in your external JavaScript file (app.js):
const script = document.currentScript;
const username = script.dataset.username;
const role = script.dataset.role;
console.log(username); // “jdoe”
console.log(role); // “admin”
This method avoids embedding logic or data inline, helping your site load faster and enabling accessibility enhancements to be available sooner.
6. Compress Images and Use Image Sprites
Large, uncompressed images are one of the most common causes of slow website speed. Heavy image files take longer to load, especially for users on mobile devices or slower connections. Optimising image files and using sprites (combining multiple small images into a single file) can greatly improve performance, making sites both faster and more accessible.
What to do:
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Compress image files without sacrificing quality by using tools such as TinyPNG or ImageOptim.
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Use image sprites for icons or other small graphics to reduce HTTP requests and speed up loading.
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Always provide descriptive alt text for every image, including those in sprites, so screen reader users can access the information.
7. Use Lazy Loading for Images and Videos
Lazy loading improves performance by delaying the loading of media files such as images and videos until they appear within the user’s viewport. Instead of forcing everything to load upfront, lazy loading reduces the initial page load time and allows text content to become accessible more quickly. This approach is especially helpful for users on slower connections and ensures the browsing experience feels faster and more responsive.
What to do:
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Implement lazy loading for non-critical media so users can access text-based content without waiting for every image or video to load.
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Make lazy loading programmatically accessible by including appropriate ARIA attributes and alternative text for images.
8. Optimise Google Analytics Metrics
Google Analytics provides valuable insights into web speed and overall site performance. Tracking metrics such as Time to First Paint (TTFP) and First Contentful Paint (FCP) helps measure how quickly users begin to see and interact with content.
These indicators are especially important for understanding how delays affect people who rely on assistive technologies. A slow start to rendering can make the site feel unresponsive and create barriers to accessibility. Ongoing accessibility governance and training ensure that teams use these metrics effectively and continue to improve performance over time.
What to do:
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Monitor TTFP and FCP regularly, and aim to reduce them by improving load times.
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Use Core Web Vitals and other performance tools to evaluate how speed issues affect users, particularly those relying on screen readers, speech recognition software, or other assistive technologies.
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Apply optimisations such as code compression, efficient image handling, and caching strategies to improve these metrics.
9. Minimise HTTP Requests
Every time a page loads, the browser makes multiple HTTP requests for assets such as images, scripts, and stylesheets. Each request adds to the overall loading process, and the more requests a site generates, the slower it becomes. High numbers of requests are a common cause of reduced website speed, which can frustrate users and limit accessibility.
What to do:
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Combine files such as CSS and JavaScript to reduce the total number of requests.
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Limit unnecessary elements on the page that increase load times.
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Use content delivery networks (CDNs) to serve static files more efficiently.
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Reduce reliance on external resources where possible to avoid delays from third-party servers.
Does a Slow Website Cause Frustration?
A slow website can quickly become a source of frustration for users. Long waits make it harder to complete tasks, reduce trust in the site, and increase the chance of abandonment. For users with disabilities, delays can be even more stressful, since assistive technologies may compound the wait or make navigation unpredictable.
Over time, frustration caused by slow loading directly reduces engagement, accessibility, and overall satisfaction.
What Is a Good Speed for a Website?
Industry standards suggest that a site should load in under three seconds on desktop and closer to two and a half seconds on mobile. Faster performance is always better, as short page load times improve accessibility, boost user satisfaction, and help with search engine rankings.
Google’s Core Web Vitals provide useful benchmarks for measuring whether a site’s web speed meets modern expectations, focusing on how quickly content appears and how stable the experience feels during loading.
Final Thoughts
Slow-loading websites have a serious impact on both accessibility and user experience. Barriers created by poor website speed can prevent people, especially those with disabilities, from accessing content effectively. By applying strategies such as compressing files, deferring JavaScript, optimising images, and using lazy loading, you can reduce page load time and make your site faster, more inclusive, and easier to navigate.
Improving website performance is not a one-time fix. It is an ongoing process that requires collaboration between designers, developers, and accessibility specialists. Prioritising both speed and accessibility ensures your site works well for everyone and guarantees that no user is left behind because of slow loading.
Ready to make your website more inclusive? Explore our Stay Accessible services that help you maintain performance and accessibility over time.