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PDF Accessibility Checklist: Tagged PDF Basics (Free Checklist)

October 21, 2026 · 4 min read · By the DollarWise team
PDF Accessibility Checklist: Tagged PDF Basics (Free Checklist)
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Most PDFs are invisible to the people who need assistive technology most. A PDF without tags is just a picture of words to a screen reader — headings, tables, and reading order all lost. Fixing that isn’t mysterious: it’s a repeatable checklist of tags, reading order, alt text, and final testing. This 28-point checklist walks you through tagged-PDF basics in the order professionals actually work: document structure first, then reading order, images, tables, links and forms, and finally color, contrast, and screen-reader verification. It’s built for designers, office workers, educators, and anyone publishing PDFs that the public will read.

What’s inside this checklist

The checklist is organized into six sections that mirror a real remediation workflow. Section one covers document structure and tags — the hierarchy screen readers navigate by. Section two fixes reading order, the most common failure in auto-tagged PDFs. Section three handles images, alt text, and charts. Section four covers data tables, where most accessibility errors hide. Section five tackles links, form fields, and language settings. Section six finishes with color contrast and the final validation pass. Every item is a concrete yes-or-no check, each with a one-click copy button so you can paste the list into your own QA docs.

The 28-point accessibility checklist

  1. The PDF is tagged — the tags panel shows a logical tag tree, not an empty document.
  2. Tags follow one logical hierarchy: Document, headings, paragraphs, lists, tables, figures.
  3. Every page's content appears in the tag tree — nothing untagged or wrongly marked as artifact.
  4. Heading levels are sequential (H1, H2, H3) with no skipped levels.
  5. Exactly one H1 exists, matching the document title.
  6. Lists use proper list tags (L, LI, Lbl, LBody) — not typed dashes or numbers.
  7. No empty tags or empty paragraphs used for spacing.
  8. Reading order matches visual order — verified with a screen reader or Read Out Loud.
  9. Multi-column layouts read column by column, not across columns line by line.
  10. Headers, footers, and page numbers are marked as artifacts so screen readers skip them.
  11. Sidebars and callout boxes sit correctly in the reading order.
  12. Every informative image has concise alt text describing what it shows.
  13. Decorative images are marked as artifacts — skipped by screen readers.
  14. Charts have alt text summarizing the key data point; full data lives in text or a table.
  15. No image-of-text is used where real text would work (logos excepted).
  16. Data tables use proper table tags (Table, TR, TH, TD) with header cells marked TH.
  17. Complex tables define header scope (row/column) for correct screen reader announcements.
  18. Tables have a caption or summary describing their purpose.
  19. Layout tables used for positioning are NOT tagged as tables.
  20. Every link uses meaningful link text — never "click here" or bare URLs.
  21. Form fields are tagged, labeled, and follow a logical tab order.
  22. The document's primary language is set in document properties.
  23. Passages in another language have that language set on the enclosing tag.
  24. The document title is set in properties and displays in the title bar.
  25. Information is never conveyed by color alone — labels or patterns back it up.
  26. Text meets WCAG contrast ratios: 4.5:1 for body text, 3:1 for large text.
  27. The full accessibility checker reports zero errors; warnings reviewed individually.
  28. Tested with an actual screen reader (NVDA, JAWS, or VoiceOver) on the first, a middle, and the last page.

How to use this checklist

  1. Start from a tagged PDF: export with tags from Word or InDesign, or OCR plus autotag a scan — then fix by hand, because autotagging alone is never enough.
  2. Work the checklist top to bottom: structure, reading order, images, tables, links and forms, then the final checks.
  3. Verify reading order with the Order panel and a real screen reader pass — the checker can’t catch a wrong-but-valid order.
  4. Fix the common failures fast: use Table Cell Properties for TH and scope issues, and the Tags panel to re-nest skipped heading levels.
  5. Re-run the full accessibility checker after every fix round until it reports zero errors, then do the final screen-reader test.

The single highest-value habit is testing with a screen reader yourself. Five minutes of listening reveals problems no automated checker can find — and it permanently changes how you build documents.

Frequently asked questions

What is a tagged PDF? A tagged PDF contains a hidden structure tree that tells assistive technology what each element is — headings, paragraphs, lists, tables, figures — and the order to read them in. Without tags, a screen reader sees only an unstructured jumble of text.

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Is an accessible PDF required by law? In many contexts, yes. Public-sector bodies in the US (Section 508), the EU (European Accessibility Act), and the UK face legal requirements, and lawsuits over inaccessible documents keep rising. Even where not legally required, accessible PDFs reach more readers.

Can I make a scanned PDF accessible? Yes, but OCR comes first. Run optical character recognition to create a real text layer, then tag the document and fix the reading order. A scanned image of text is invisible to screen readers until OCR is applied.

Download the checklist

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