To ensure inclusivity in all forms, the businesses of today are placing greater ethical focus on ensuring that technology is accessible to everybody. This aids in fostering a more inclusive society, wherein people with disabilities are denied a complete and comprehensive digital experience due to accessibility issues - this, in turn, reinforces societal inequality. Therefore, lobbying for accessible technology initiatives inside companies is now a must.  With so much to consider and such an expansive scope, it can be daunting to figure out how best to capture accessibility in tech. The good news is that the industry collectively is more aware of the issues than ever. When we strive to improve people's lives, however, niche their needs may seem, everyone stands to gain. Read on to learn how a more equitable world can be achieved by incorporating accessibility into technology: 

Innovation & Evolution

The way we interact is changing due to advancements in artificial intelligence, machine learning, and voice technology. Every industry is impacted by this, even one you might not have thought of: accessible and adaptive technology.  A device equipped with speech recognition technology improves one's capacity to communicate and comprehend to a higher level. Furthermore, keyboard accessibility is a crucial aspect of web accessibility. A flexible keyboard enables a variety of personalised keyboard layouts that the user can print. To add, Accessible Rich Internet Applications (ARAI) is a collection of features that helps people with disabilities use dynamic material and sophisticated pages more efficiently.

Apps Redefining Accessibility

For people with disabilities, new tools are opening new pathways for participation. In addition, industry leaders have made strides in developing platforms with accessibility in mind and designing updates to compensate for earlier versions that were not. 

• Google added a Braille keyboard in its Android TalkBack screen reader and boosted live caption features.
• Apple's iOS 14 update, for example, helps detect if someone in a video call is using sign language and will make that individual visually prominent. 
• Microsoft has placed tactile nubs on Xbox products and shipping boxes so people with low vision can open them independently.

Digital Accessibility and Future

If businesses learn to look at accessibility with a lens of promise from the moment of execution, one can start to imagine what UI/UX services will look like 20 years from now. We can expect to see advancements in gesture, touch and optical tracking across all devices, allowing people with a range of disabilities to control and use computers comfortably. Once digital content is better formatted, tagged, and structured to be accessible, algorithms will have more data for better processing, make better connections, and altogether serve you better. MR, AR, and VR technologies are subject to design choices. This lets us build a space where it's the user's choice whether or not to use sight, sound, or touch. One sense can be mapped to another.

Accelerating Business Growth 

Accessibility in technology brings up a wide range of advantages for organisations while giving their audience an equal chance to profit from their products or services. Businesses that use digitally accessible web applications tend to have higher traffic and an easier user interface. More than 80% of people with impairments have decided not to trust a business because of barriers. Accessibility features won't turn away current customers but will attract new customers and improve conversions. Accessible technology assists in learning about the obligation of ethical advocacy within the business sector.

Enhancing UX for Businesses

By not making apps and sites accessible, you automatically exclude a large portion of your audience by preventing them from having an equivalent experience to users without any disability. Accessibility boosts UX, which boosts SEO services, which boosts rankings, and improves the overall brand. This indicates a direct positive correlation between SERP rankings and commitment to accessibility.  Implementing accessibility from the get-go necessitates a strict adherence to proper coding standards. Code thus produced is overall cleaner and more performant; it's being accessible is just added value. Being inclusive with accessibility in technology will unlock the potential for superior UX. Streamlined procedures that take into account the spectrum of accessibility improve satisfaction, functionality and customer retention. 

Final Thoughts

Accessibility in technology is not just the idea of making the internet legible but also applying design innovation to increase accessibility. It's not only the right thing to conquer; it's also important right now to the day-to-day computing for every person. From being something designers pursue grudgingly, accessibility should be viewed as what it is: a telescope through which we can see the all-encompassing future of tech. By pushing the boundaries of who has access to resources, information, and services, more innovation in technology can deliver on its promise of easy-to-use, accessible digital services that also enhance the quality of life.