Learn about this crucial aspect of web design that ensures an inclusive and accessible online experience, aids in website navigation, and promotes clarity.
Why are iframe titles important?
- Screen Reader Accessibility:
Providing descriptive titles for iframes ensures that users who rely on screen readers can understand the purpose and content of the embedded elements. - Contextual Understanding:
A meaningful title helps users grasp the context and relevance of the embedded content within the broader webpage. - Keyboard Navigation:
Clear iframe titles enable keyboard-only users to navigate more efficiently through the webpage, as they can understand where each iframe leads or what it contains. - Compliance with Accessibility Standards:
As including titles for iframes is a requirement under WCAG guidelines for ensuring website accessibility, including them is necessary for meeting legal and ethical obligations to accommodate users with disabilities.
Even well-known and widely utilized embeddable content, frustratingly, does not automatically include an iframe title. We wish they did too, but be sure to check, even if you’re grabbing an embed from Youtube or Google!
To add an iframe title to an existing iframe, you’ll simply need to add a batch to the code inside the <iframe> tag, add the title attribute, and provide a descriptive title within double quotes. For example:
<iframe src="https://example.com" title="Descriptive Title"></iframe>
If you were adding a title for a Google Maps iframe, for example, you would add: Title=“GoogleMaps”
For a step-by-step example of finding and fixing issues like this, see below.