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How to Make a PDF Accessible: A Step-by-Step Guide for Non-Developers

The fastest way to find out whether your PDF is accessible: open it and try to select a sentence with your cursor. If the text highlights, there is a real text layer and you have something to work with. If you get a blue box around the whole page instead, it is a scanned image, and a screen reader reads exactly nothing from it. That thirty-second test tells you which half of this guide you need.

The reason so many business PDFs fail it is that the default output of Word, Google Docs, InDesign, and every “Print to PDF” dialog is an untagged document. Tags are the invisible structure that tells a screen reader what is a heading, what is a table row, and what order to read things in. Unless someone deliberately added them, they are not there — which is true even at companies that already invested in making their websites accessible. The website got the attention; the PDF library did not.

This guide covers what makes a PDF accessible, how to check the ones you have already published, and how to produce accessible ones from the tools you actually use — without developer skills or expensive software. If you are still drafting the document, start upstream with accessible Word and Google Docs, because almost everything that goes wrong in a PDF was already wrong in the source file.

Why PDF Accessibility Matters

In the United States, ADA Title III has been applied by courts to the content businesses publish online, and a PDF hosted on your site is content you published. Public entities have a harder deadline: the DOJ’s Title II web rule requires WCAG 2.1 AA conformance, and it covers documents as well as pages, by April 26, 2027 for entities serving 50,000 or more people and April 26, 2028 for smaller entities and special districts. The European Accessibility Act, enforceable since 28 June 2025, covers digital documents attached to in-scope services. (Nothing here is legal advice.)

The practical point is narrower than the legal one: a demand letter about your website will often list the PDFs too, because they are the easiest thing on a site to test and the most likely thing to fail. See ADA website lawsuits for how that process usually starts.

Who Is Affected

When we talk about accessible PDFs, we are primarily talking about people who use screen readers — software that reads digital content aloud. Screen readers are used by people who are blind or have low vision, but also by people with dyslexia, cognitive disabilities, or even temporary situations like a broken arm.

An inaccessible PDF is essentially invisible to a screen reader. The software either cannot read it at all, or reads it in a jumbled, meaningless order. Imagine trying to understand a restaurant menu where all the items and prices are read out in random order. That is the experience an inaccessible PDF creates.

Business Benefits

Beyond legal compliance, accessible PDFs benefit your business:

  • Better SEO: Search engines can index accessible PDFs more effectively, meaning your content appears in more search results.
  • Wider audience: Approximately 15% of the global population has some form of disability. Accessible documents reach more people.
  • Professional image: Accessible documents signal that your business takes inclusivity seriously.
  • Future-proofing: Accessibility regulations are expanding, not shrinking. Getting ahead now saves costly retrofitting later.

The Most Common PDF Accessibility Problems

Before we get into solutions, here are the issues you are most likely dealing with:

1. Scanned PDFs (Image-Only PDFs)

This is the biggest offender. When you scan a paper document, the result is essentially a photograph. There is no actual text in the file — just a picture of text. A screen reader sees nothing.

How to check: Open the PDF and try to select text with your cursor. If you cannot highlight individual words, it is likely an image-only PDF.

2. Missing Document Structure

Even if your PDF contains real text, it might lack the tags that tell a screen reader what is a heading, what is a paragraph, what is a list, and what order to read them in. Without this structure, the screen reader just streams all the text as one continuous block.

3. Missing Alternative Text for Images

Just like on websites, images in PDFs need alternative text (alt text) that describes what the image shows. Decorative images should be marked as such so screen readers skip them.

4. Poor Reading Order

PDFs with multiple columns, sidebars, or complex layouts often have a reading order that makes no sense to a screen reader. The software might jump from a heading to a sidebar callout to the middle of a paragraph.

5. Inaccessible Tables

Tables in PDFs are notoriously problematic. Without proper header tags, a screen reader user has no way to understand which data belongs to which column or row. The rules are the same ones that govern accessible HTML tables — real header cells, no layout tables, no merged cells you can avoid — but they are considerably harder to repair after export, which is a good argument for getting the table right in the source document.

6. Missing Document Title and Language

Every PDF should have a document title (not just a filename) and a specified language. These help screen readers announce the document correctly.

How to Check Your PDFs for Accessibility

You do not need expensive tools to run a basic check. Here are free options:

Adobe Acrobat Reader (Free)

If you have the free Adobe Acrobat Reader, you can do a basic manual check:

  1. Open the PDF
  2. Try selecting text — if you cannot, it is an image-only PDF
  3. Go to File and then Properties to check if a document title and language are set
  4. Try using Tab to navigate through any form fields

PAC 2024 (Free, Windows)

PDF Accessibility Checker (PAC) is a free tool from the PDF/UA Foundation. It runs a comprehensive automated check against the PDF/UA standard (the international standard for PDF accessibility).

  1. Download PAC from the PDF/UA Foundation website
  2. Open your PDF in PAC
  3. Click “Start Check”
  4. Review the results — PAC will flag missing tags, reading order issues, missing alt text, and more

Grackle Go (Free Check)

Grackle offers a free initial accessibility check for PDFs. Upload your file and get a report of the main issues.

The Manual Screen Reader Test

The most reliable test is to actually experience your PDF with a screen reader:

  • Windows: NVDA is free. Install it, open your PDF, and press the down arrow to listen to the content read aloud.
  • Mac: VoiceOver is built in. Press Command+F5 to activate it, then open your PDF.
  • Phone: Both iOS (VoiceOver) and Android (TalkBack) have built-in screen readers.

Listen for: Does it read in the right order? Are headings announced? Are images described? Can you navigate by headings?

How to Create Accessible PDFs

The best approach depends on what tool you use to create your PDFs.

From Microsoft Word

Word is one of the easiest starting points for accessible PDFs, because its accessibility features translate well to PDF format.

Before exporting:

  1. Use heading styles (Heading 1, Heading 2, etc.) instead of just making text bold and large. This creates the document structure screen readers need.
  2. Add alt text to images: Right-click an image, select “Edit Alt Text,” and write a brief description.
  3. Use built-in list styles instead of manually typing bullet points or numbers.
  4. Use the table feature for tabular data, and designate header rows. Do not use tables for layout.
  5. Run the accessibility checker: Go to Review, then Check Accessibility. Fix any issues it flags.

Exporting:

  • Go to File, then Save As, and choose PDF
  • On Windows: Click Options and check “Document structure tags for accessibility”
  • On Mac: The tags are included by default when saving as PDF

From Google Docs

Google Docs has improved its PDF export, but it is still less reliable than Word for accessibility.

  1. Use heading styles (available in the toolbar dropdown that says “Normal text”)
  2. Add alt text to images (right-click, then Alt Text)
  3. Use built-in lists and tables
  4. Export via File, then Download, then PDF Document

Important: Google Docs PDF exports sometimes lose their tag structure. After exporting, check the result with PAC or Adobe Acrobat.

From Canva

Canva is popular for visually rich documents but has historically been weak on accessibility. Recent updates have improved things:

  1. Add alt text to images in your design (click the image, then the three dots, then Alternative Text)
  2. Use Canva’s text hierarchy features
  3. When downloading, select PDF Standard and check “Include alt text in your PDF” if the option is available

Be aware: Canva PDFs with complex layouts often have reading order problems. For critical documents, consider using Canva for design mockups but recreating the final version in Word.

From Adobe InDesign

If your team uses InDesign for professional layouts:

  1. Use paragraph styles mapped to PDF tags
  2. Set the reading order in the Articles panel
  3. Add alt text in Object Export Options
  4. Export using the “Create Tagged PDF” option

Fixing Existing PDFs

If you have PDFs that are already published and need fixing:

For image-only PDFs: You need to run OCR (Optical Character Recognition) to convert the image into actual text. Adobe Acrobat Pro can do this (paid), but so can free tools like the built-in OCR in Microsoft OneNote or the free NAPS2 software.

For PDFs missing tags and structure: Adobe Acrobat Pro has the most complete remediation tools. It is a paid product, but if you have many PDFs to fix, it is worth the investment. You can add tags, set reading order, add alt text, and define table headers.

For simple documents: Sometimes the fastest fix is to recreate the document in Word with proper structure and re-export.

A Practical Workflow for Your Business

Here is a realistic workflow you can implement today:

Step 1: Audit What You Have

Go through your website and list every PDF that is currently available for download. Prioritize them:

  • High priority: Documents that customers must access (menus, pricing, applications, terms of service)
  • Medium priority: Marketing materials, brochures, case studies
  • Lower priority: Archived or rarely accessed documents

Step 2: Fix or Remove the Worst Offenders

Start with high-priority documents. For each one:

  1. Check if it is an image-only PDF. If so, either recreate it or run OCR.
  2. Run PAC or the Acrobat accessibility checker.
  3. Fix the issues or recreate the document using the guidelines above.

If a PDF is outdated or rarely used, consider removing it from your website entirely. Fewer inaccessible documents means less legal risk.

Step 3: Set Up Your Process Going Forward

Make accessibility part of your document creation workflow, not an afterthought:

  • Create templates in Word with proper heading styles and accessibility settings already configured
  • Add an accessibility check to your document review process
  • Train anyone who creates documents on the basics (headings, alt text, reading order)

Step 4: Consider HTML Alternatives

For many documents, an accessible web page is better than an accessible PDF. HTML is inherently more flexible for assistive technology. Consider whether some of your PDFs could be replaced with web pages.

For example, a restaurant menu as an HTML page is almost always more accessible (and more mobile-friendly) than a PDF menu.

Common Questions

Do I need to make every PDF accessible? If it is publicly available on your website, yes. Internal documents have different requirements depending on your jurisdiction and whether you have employees who need accommodations.

Is PDF/UA compliance required? PDF/UA is the international standard (ISO 14289). While not every law explicitly requires PDF/UA compliance, meeting this standard is the most reliable way to ensure your PDFs are accessible. The EAA references harmonized European standards that align closely with PDF/UA.

What about fillable PDF forms? Fillable forms have additional requirements. Every form field needs a label, the tab order must be logical, and required fields must be clearly indicated. These are especially important because forms often collect critical information (applications, orders, registrations).

Can AI tools fix PDF accessibility automatically? AI-powered tools can help with some tasks, like generating alt text for images or running OCR on scanned documents. However, no tool can fully automate PDF accessibility. Document structure, reading order, and meaningful alt text still require human judgment.

Key Takeaways

  1. PDF accessibility is a legal requirement under ADA and EAA, not optional.
  2. Most business PDFs are inaccessible — you are not alone, but you do need to act.
  3. The biggest quick win is ensuring your PDFs contain real text, not scanned images.
  4. Use heading styles, alt text, and proper tables when creating documents in Word or Google Docs.
  5. Check your PDFs with free tools like PAC 2024 before publishing.
  6. Consider HTML alternatives for documents that do not need to be PDFs.

Start with your most important documents and work outward. Perfection is not the goal — progress is. Every PDF you make accessible is one more document that works for everyone.

Want to know what is actually broken on your site? Get an accessibility report.