Creating accessible Google Slides

Google products are embedded into most of the K-12 classrooms in the United States. More than 150 million students and educators rely on Google Workspace for Education, according to EdTech, June 18, 2024. Launched in 2014, Google Classroom has been a suite of secure, easy-to-use tools designed for teaching and learning. Google Workspace for Education is a paid upgrade with advanced security and analytics. Both Google platforms use the same suite of Google apps.

In the classroom, students use a variety of Google apps, including Google Drive, Google Docs, Google Sheets and Google Slides. In this post, we are specifically going to take a deeper dive into Google Slides, specifically looking at how to create accessible Google Slides for students who are blind or low vision. In the next post, we’ll look at how to navigate Google Slides with JAWS. But, before the student can navigate Google Slides, the slide deck must first be created with accessibility in mind!

How to create accessible Google Slides

General accessibility best practices

Use a Google Slides template
- Use the available Google Slides template (built-in layout). Do not add textboxes, as the content inside an added textbox will not be read by a screen reader!
- Delete any unused textboxes from the Google Slide template
Create unique slide titles
- If the same title is used, add the number of that duplicated slide title and the total number of slides with the duplicated title. Example slide title: “Accessible Google Slides (1 of 2)”
Font size
- Headings 32 points or larger, subheadings 30 points or larger, text 28 points or larger (some accessibility sources say at least 24 points)
- Bold text is more visible than standard text
Preferred fonts
- Arial, Verdana, Tahoma, Antique Olive or APHont
Avoid italics
- Better choices are quotations or bold print
- Underlines should only be used for links
Left alignment only
Backgrounds and text
- High contrast
- Simple, not graphical
- One color, or
- Two color gradients where one is white and the other is pastel
- Avoid grey background or grey text
- Avoid shadowed text
Avoid or limit animations
Simple slide layout
- Break content into bullet points if possible
- No more than three blocks
- No more than 6 lines per block
- Try not to use columns
- No more than 6 bullets
- Avoid dividing words at end of text
- Avoid using color to convey meaning
Graphics
- Avoid grey scale graphics/ low contrast
- Use patterns or high contrast color instead

*Screen readers do not read animations/transitions

Google Slides for students who use screen readers

General accessibility best practices (listed above)
Avoid tables and data visualizations
Do not create tables and charts from the ribbon within Google Slides
- The table feature in the Slides ribbon does not allow adding headers
- Tables created from the Slides ribbon cannot be navigated up/down in a column with a screen reader
Create charts and graphs in another program and copy/paste into Google Slides
- Charts, graphs and data visualizations pasted into Slides are not accessible with a screen reader; include alt text descriptions and/or addition text descriptions
Alt text descriptions
- Images need alt text descriptions; images can also be described in the text on the slide
- To add Alt Text Description: Right-click on the image to bring up a menu with the options “Add Alt Text” or “Edit Image”. Type in picture description.
Videos
- Should be captioned, audio described and transcripts made available
Hyperlinks
- Use descriptive text to name or briefly describe the link destination
Reading Order
- Review Reading Order of the content on each slide
- Reorder slide elements by right clicking on each and selecting “Order” and then sending elements backwards or forwards.
- Test order by tabbing through elements on the slide; order is typically left to right, top to bottom
Use Accessibility Checker
- Check the accessibility of each slide with the Accessibility Checker add-on and test using a screen reader.
- To install the Accessibility Checker for Slides:
  - Add-ons > Get Add-Ons > In the search box, type “Accessibility Checker for Slides” > select “Accessibility Checker for Slides add-on by Lovely API > Install (sign in to allow installation)

Educators should share a copy of the Google Slide deck with a student who is blind or low vision prior to class, so that the student can access Google Slides on his/her personal device. Low vision students may prefer to access Google Slides in class with a screen sharing app.

Download the Creating accessible Google Slides handout here.