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Read moreWCAG 2.1 Level AA: Who Needs to Follow It and Why
WCAG 2.1 Level AA is the technical standard that U.S. courts and the Department of Justice (DOJ) treat as the default measure of digital accessibility. If your website serves the U.S. public, it almost certainly applies to you. Below, we’ll break down who’s legally required to meet WCAG 2.1 Level AA, which law applies to you, and how to keep conformance once you have it.
Author: Missy Jensen, Senior Content Strategist: AI Search and Discovery
Published: 10/07/2026
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“Do we have to be accessible?” is rarely the real question. Most organizations are aware that accessibility matters, but what they can’t pin down is whether the requirements legally bind them, or which standard they’re actually required to follow.
The answer comes down to who you are and who you serve as a business. WCAG, the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines published by the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C), defines what an accessible website looks like. The law determines who must meet it.
Below is a clean map of both: who must comply, which law puts them there, and why WCAG became the standard everyone points to.
WCAG Conformance Levels, Briefly
WCAG has three conformance levels. Level A covers the most basic requirements. Level AA adds the criteria that affect most users and is the level nearly every accessibility law references. Meeting WCAG 2.1 Level AA means meeting 50 success criteria: 30 at Level A and 20 at Level AA. Level AAA is the highest bar and is not expected across an entire site.
Put simply, Level AA is the standard organizations should aim for to meet compliance requirements.
WCAG 2.1 vs. 2.2, and Why 2.1 is Still the Floor
The most recent version of WCAG is WCAG 2.2. Most U.S. law still references WCAG 2.1 Level AA, so 2.1 AA is the binding floor today. That doesn't make 2.2 irrelevant. Meeting 2.2 satisfies 2.1, so building to the newer version improves your site's accessibility and gets ahead of future enforcement.
For more on what changed between versions, see our breakdown of WCAG 2.2.
Who Legally Needs WCAG 2.1 Level AA
Which law makes WCAG your standard depends on who you are and who you serve. Federal agencies and their vendors answer to Section 508. State and local governments must follow Title II of the Americans with Disabilities Act(opens in a new tab) (ADA). Private businesses open to the public are subject to Title III of the ADA. Many organizations fall under more than one, and that law determines which WCAG version you actually owe.
Federal Agencies and Contractors (Section 508)
Section 508 of the Rehabilitation Act requires federal agencies to make their digital technology accessible, and it extends to the vendors that sell to them as well. If you sell to a federal agency, accessibility conformance is part of the procurement process, usually demonstrated with a VPAT or conformance report.
One detail matters here: Section 508 requirements point to WCAG 2.0 Level AA, not 2.1. Plenty of agencies and vendors build to 2.1 or 2.2 anyway, since the newer versions handle mobile and modern interfaces, and one higher bar is easier to manage than several. Meeting 2.1 also satisfies 2.0, but the legal floor under Section 508 is still WCAG 2.0 Level AA.
For more information, check out our explainer on the ADA, Section 508, and WCAG.
State and Local Government (ADA Title II)
ADA Title II covers state and local governments. That includes cities, counties, public universities, K-12 districts, courts, libraries, and special districts. The DOJ’s 2024 Final Rule formally adopted WCAG 2.1 Level AA as the technical standard for the web content and mobile apps these entities provide.
The rule also applies to content provided through contractors and third-party vendors, such as payment portals or scheduling tools. It includes limited exceptions, such as archived content that isn’t actively used and certain documents posted before the compliance date.
Compliance deadlines were extended in April 2026. Entities with a population of 50,000 or more now have until April 26, 2027. Smaller entities and special districts have until April 26, 2028. Public colleges and universities follow the deadline of the state or local government they belong to.
The substantive requirement did not change; the standard is still WCAG 2.1 Level AA.
Businesses Open to the Public (ADA Title III)
Title III of the ADA covers private businesses open to the public. Retailers, restaurants, banks, healthcare providers, hotels, and most e-commerce sites fall into this category. That includes online-only stores: courts have consistently treated e-commerce sites as places of public accommodation. Courts and settlements routinely use WCAG Level AA as the benchmark in web accessibility cases. A private business with no government ties is still covered if it serves the public.
This is also where most accessibility lawsuits occur. Because Title III gives individuals a private right of action, web accessibility claims have become a steady category of litigation.
Organizations Selling into the EU
If you sell certain digital products or services to consumers in the European Union, the European Accessibility Act (EAA) applies, even if your company is based in the U.S. The EAA took effect in June 2025 and covers areas like e-commerce, banking, e-books, and transportation services. Its harmonized standard, EN 301 549, incorporates WCAG 2.1 Level AA for web content, so a site built to 2.1 AA standards is already aligned with the core expectations of the EAA.
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Is WCAG 2.1 Level AA Legally Required in the U.S.?
For state and local governments, yes: the DOJ’s 2024 Title II rule names WCAG 2.1 Level AA as the required standard. For private businesses, no law names WCAG directly, but courts and settlements in ADA Title III cases routinely use WCAG Level AA as the measure of an accessible website. In practice, that makes it the standard to meet.
This is the distinction that can get confusing. WCAG is not a law. The ADA and Section 508 are laws. WCAG is the technical yardstick against which those laws are measured in practice.
For more on how the ADA and WCAG relate, see our breakdown of the differences between ADA and WCAG.
Conformance Is Not a One-Time Checkbox
"Passing" a one-time audit is not the finish when it comes to accessibility. The harder part is maintaining conformance with WCAG criteria, so that when a complaint or procurement review puts your site under the microscope, you have current proof rather than scattered scans and half-updated spreadsheets.
The bottom line: WCAG 2.1 Level AA conformance is not a state you reach once. It's something you hold. And holding it requires the right combination of tools and people, working continuously rather than in one-off checks. That's where the right platform makes the difference.
How AudioEye Helps You Achieve WCAG 2.1 Level AA Conformance
Meeting WCAG 2.1 Level AA conformance requires both automation and human expertise, because the two solve different halves of the problem. A platform that combines automation with expert testing lets you verify accessibility rather than assume it: automation handles scale, and certified experts use assistive technology to catch the issues that require judgment.
AudioEye brings both halves together, automating what's possible and putting experts on the rest:
Active Monitoring scans continuously and flags issues as new content ships, so a page that conformed last month doesn't quietly fall out of conformance this month.
AudioEye's Automated Fixes resolve common, machine-detectable issues at scale while Expert Audits cover what software cannot. Whether a page works with a screen reader, whether every function is reachable by keyboard, whether link text makes sense in context. These are judgment calls that need a person testing with assistive technology.
Expert Audits and AI-powered automation work together to find issues and deliver expert-written Custom Fixes, resolving up to 97% of issues. The work documents itself as it happens. When someone asks you to show proof, it’s already there.
See exactly where your site stands against WCAG guidelines. Get started with a free scan.
Want to see AudioEye in action? Schedule a demo.
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