Background
A Voluntary Product Accessibility Template (VPAT) is a document that outlines how well a product aligns with accessibility (a11y) standards. Its primary purpose is to inform customers about a product’s a11y features, enabling them to make informed decisions before purchasing software.
At Slack, we conducted a VPAT by a third party a11y vendor in 2024 following our significant UI change (IA4). During this VPAT process, we identified a11y issues across Android, iOS, and desktop. Of the issues identified on Android, we immediately assigned the obvious shovel-ready issues, such as those with color contrast and missing image labels, to the responsible teams for resolution.
To address remaining Android issues, we conducted a comprehensive triage process. In this document, we take a look at the major recurring themes of Android accessibility issues and share resolution strategies and lessons learned in the hopes of helping others make similar improvements.
Identified themes
