Accessibility Audit Cost: What Drives the Price of a WCAG Audit

Accessibility audit cost depends on how much distinct work there is to test, not on how big your website looks. The main factors are the number of unique templates and user journeys in scope, the standard you're testing against, whether documents or apps are included, whether you need an Accessibility Conformance Report (ACR), and whether re-testing after your fixes is part of the price.

Two quotes for "an accessibility audit" can describe very different things. One may be an automated scan exported to PDF. Another may be days of hands-on testing with keyboards and screen readers, a developer-ready report and a re-test. Comparing them on the headline number alone tells you very little.

This guide explains each cost factor, why per-page pricing misleads, the red flags of a cheap audit, and how to scope one so your budget goes into finding and fixing real barriers. We don't quote market price ranges here on purpose: published figures vary wildly, mostly come from vendors, and rarely say what was included.

What drives accessibility audit cost

Almost every factor comes back to one question: how many hours of skilled manual testing will this take? A manual audit is mostly a specialist's time, so anything that adds something new to test adds cost.

Unique templates

A template is one distinct layout or screen: your home page, a product page, the checkout, a sign-up dialog. Pages built on the same template share the same code, so they share the same barriers. An auditor who tests one product page has effectively tested all of them. The number of unique templates is the biggest single driver of price.

User journeys

WCAG conformance applies to complete processes, so key tasks (booking, buying, applying, signing in) need to be tested start to finish, including error states and alternate paths. A long multi-step flow with conditional questions takes much more time than a simple contact form.

How interactive the site is

Static content pages are quick to test. Custom components take longer: date pickers, mega menus, carousels, drag-and-drop, live search, maps, dashboards and anything built from scratch instead of native HTML controls. Each needs careful keyboard and screen reader testing across several states.

Standard and level

In Ontario, the AODA baseline is WCAG 2.0 Level AA. Many contracts and buyers ask for WCAG 2.1 or 2.2 AA instead; US federal procurement uses Section 508, and European buyers often ask for EN 301 549. Testing to WCAG 2.2 AA covers the WCAG 2.0 AA criteria too, so one audit can serve several requirements. Adding Level AAA, or a second standard with its own extra requirements, adds work.

Assistive technologies and platforms

Each combination of screen reader, browser and device is another pass through the same journeys. A website tested on desktop and mobile web takes less time than a website plus native iOS and Android apps, which are audited as separate products.

Documents

PDFs, Word files and forms that people need to complete a task are part of the experience, but they're tested and fixed differently from web pages, usually priced by page. A site with hundreds of downloadable PDFs can need more document work than web testing.

An ACR or VPAT

If a buyer has asked for an Accessibility Conformance Report, the audit has to produce a formal, criterion-by-criterion conformance statement on top of the findings report. Each extra edition (WCAG, Section 508, EN 301 549) adds writing and review.

Re-testing and support

Some quotes stop at the report. Others include a walkthrough call, help for your developers while they fix, and a re-test of every finding. The second is worth more, and costs more, but it's the only version that ends with evidence your barriers are gone.

Timing

A hard deadline, such as a procurement submission next week, can mean rush delivery. Booking ahead is the cheapest way to avoid it.

Why per-page accessibility audit pricing misleads

Per-page pricing sounds simple and fair, but it measures the wrong thing. It charges a large, consistent site for repetition, and undercharges a small site full of one-off layouts that take real time to test.

Priced per page, the store looks like it needs an enormous audit and the portfolio a tiny one. In reality the testing effort is similar. Template-based scoping follows how sites are actually built, and it matches the W3C's evaluation methodology, which tests a representative sample of a site rather than every page.

Per-page pricing has a second problem: it rewards testing many similar pages and reporting the same template bug fifty times. You end up paying for repetition in a longer report, not for more insight.

Accessibility audit pricing red flags

A low price isn't a problem in itself. A low price for something that isn't an audit is. Watch for these:

• Automated-only reports sold as audits. If the method doesn't mention keyboard and screen reader testing by a person, it's a scan. Scans are useful, and you can get one free, but they can't judge whether alt text makes sense or whether a checkout can be completed.
• Overlays and widgets presented as a fix. A script that adds a toolbar to your site doesn't change your underlying code, and can conflict with the assistive technology people already use. In 2025 the US Federal Trade Commission finalized an order against overlay vendor accessiBe over claims that its tool could make any website WCAG-compliant. More in our article on accessibility overlays and compliance.
• Guarantees of compliance or "certification". No one can guarantee your site is compliant before the fixes are made and re-tested. The AODA has no certification scheme for websites, so a vendor's badge or certificate is a marketing claim, not proof of compliance.
• Findings without WCAG criteria. Every finding should name the success criterion it fails. Without that, you can't verify the finding or use it as evidence.
• No named tools or assistive technologies. A credible proposal says what will be tested with, such as NVDA, JAWS, VoiceOver and keyboard-only.
• No re-test. Without one, you'll never know whether your fixes worked.
• Vague scope. "Up to 10 pages" with no mention of which pages, journeys or components leaves room for the most important parts of your site to be skipped.

How to scope an audit to save money

The goal is to test less without missing anything. These steps do that:

1. Sample by template. Count each distinct layout once. If your blog has 400 posts on one layout, the audit needs one or two of them, not 400.
2. Lead with your most important journey. If budget is tight, a focused audit of the one task customers must be able to finish (book, buy, apply) gives you the most value per hour, and finds the shared components (header, navigation, forms) along the way.
3. Clear the automated issues first. Run a free automated accessibility scan and fix what it finds before the audit starts, so paid time goes on what only a person can catch.
4. Only include documents people use. Archive or remove outdated PDFs rather than paying to test or fix them.
5. Decide on the ACR up front. If a buyer will ask for one, scope it into the audit now. Commissioning an ACR separately later usually means re-testing ground already covered.
6. Freeze the site during testing. Releases mid-audit cause re-work.
7. Plan the fixes and the re-test together. Make sure the re-test window gives your team enough time to fix.

If you're an Ontario organization working to the AODA, we offer fixed-price audits scoped this way, by templates and journeys rather than page counts. See our fixed packages for what each one covers.

Think about total cost, not just the audit

The audit is usually the smaller part of the budget. What matters more is everything around it.

Remediation

Fixing the findings is where most of the effort goes, and it's where a good audit saves money. A report that pinpoints the shared component, explains the fix and orders the work by impact can turn weeks of guesswork into a few focused sprints. A vague report pushes that cost onto your developers. Our guide to building an accessibility remediation plan covers how to sequence the work.

Fixing early vs. fixing late

Accessibility is cheapest when it's designed in. A colour palette that fails contrast is a quick change in a design file and a slow one after it's spread across hundreds of pages and images. If a redesign is coming, auditing the designs or a staging build before launch costs less than auditing and fixing afterwards.

Complaints and legal risk

In Ontario, the AODA requires public sector organizations and businesses and non-profits with 50 or more employees to make their public websites meet WCAG 2.0 Level AA. The Act provides for inspections, compliance orders and administrative penalties; our AODA requirements and penalties guide sets these out. Separately, disability is a protected ground under the Ontario Human Rights Code, and people who are shut out of a service can file an application with the Human Rights Tribunal of Ontario.

If you sell into the United States, the US Department of Justice's web accessibility guidance says the ADA's requirements apply to goods and services businesses offer on the web, and website accessibility lawsuits there are common. None of this is a reason to panic, but it is a reason to compare the cost of an audit with the cost of responding to a complaint you could have prevented. This is general information, not legal advice.

Lost customers

A checkout a keyboard user can't finish is a checkout that loses sales, whether or not anyone complains. That cost doesn't show up in a quote, but it's often the largest one.

Questions to ask before you accept a quote

• Which templates and journeys are in scope, by name?
• Which standard and level will you test against?
• Which assistive technologies, browsers and devices will you use?
• How much of the testing is manual, and who does it?
• Does every finding include the WCAG criterion, severity, location and fix?
• Is there a walkthrough call, and support while we fix?
• Is a re-test included, and within what time frame?
• Is the price fixed, or can it change once testing starts?

Frequently asked questions